Would you believe if I say that we can do everything physically? However, we just need to convince our minds to do such things we want to and that flexibility (physically and mentally) is the key to achieving anything in life.
The next 30 Days of Gratitude topic is about something positive about my body and the challenges I am grateful for.
I'm a person with imperfect body features and I have a lot of flaws. Those imperfections even made me insecure about beautiful girls before and I wished to be as perfect as them as well. Not to catch the attention of the boys, but to jive in this modern society full of judgemental people. Yet, as time passed by and I learned how to love myself again, I started to appreciate my flaws. And I realized that my imperfections are what make me a unique individual.
Something positive about my bodyis its flexibility.
There is this phrase I always laugh at every time my travel buddy feels scared of my flexibility.
She would often say, "hay naku Ruby, tuhod ko nanginginig sa pinaggagawa mo."
What she mean is her legs are turning into jelly every time she sees me standing by the edge of the cliff or trying to reach a spot that seems impossible to climb for her, lol. I'm just telling her that I'm lucky to have longer legs and a flexible body that I can climb higher spots on the mountain.
I remembered back when I was first year student in college. During our sports day, one of the games was wall climbing and I got surprised and excited upon seeing the venue as I never tried wall climbing and other sports before. I was selected as one of the participants in our team and we were given a chance to practice climbing before the competition started.
Without any harness or safety gear, I found myself reaching the hand holds and stepping on the foot placements. Bravely, I was pulling my body up and the trainers were amazed at what I did, my classmates, on the other hand, were worried that I might fall. When the competition started, they sent me to climb first, but by that time, there was safety gear already.
I reached the top faster than other participants and going down was even more exciting as I had to hold the rope and glided downward while pushing my feet on the wall. And that's when I started to love wall climbing. I did want to try again a year after, but unfortunately, the gym closed because a new branch of our school was built there. I guess, the advantage I had was having quite long legs and a lighter body.
And would you believe me if I told you that I had a fever when I attended our CAT training (Citizen Army Training) in my third year of high school? I abandoned my position in our School Filipino Publication team just to be one of the school CAT officers because I found them cool marching in uniform while holding rifles and swords in our school field, lol.
And thanks to my flexible body and I was able to pass the training even if I was sick. It even helped me get better faster and I became one of the Charlie Company leaders.
As you noticed I love mountain climbing too. Believe me or not, I only had mountain hiking officially here in Hong Kong back in 2018. I did climb not-so-high hills in the Philippines and they weren't that thrilling and exciting.
I'm an adventurous slash risk-taker and I like doing new things that I thought I couldn't do to test my flexibility. Every time I do so, I am always amazed at myself by how far my flexible body can reach.
As Chane Vdw said in his quote, "flexibility isn't showing off how far your leg can reach, it's showing how far your perseverance can stretch."
Adventuring and mountain climbing are my ways of testing my flexibility and perseverance. And every time we can finish an arduous climb, it is like a great achievement to me. All thanks to my travel buddy and I am back to adventuring again. Without her, I wouldn't be doing such things.
A challenge I am grateful for was when I was able to surpass the thousands of steps of steep stairs on Violet Hill and Twin Peak. They are amongst the mountains with the toughest trails due to the brutality of the stairs. And that was thousands of steps in a row, only taking short breaks in between and when taking photos. It was such an exhilarating adventure, yet rewarding because of the beautiful scenery along the trails.
A compliment that made me feel good is when my readers felt amazed at my capabilities to finish a strenuous hike and the things I can do on the mountain.
Some are hesitant to do new things because they thought they are not capable of doing them. Yet, we wouldn't know unless we try. We shouldn't limit ourselves to things we already know, rather extend our bubble and put more new things inside so it would grow bigger. And that's how we could determine the farthest stretch we can do and how flexible and strong our body is.
That also helps us strengthen our perseverance, so we could endure whatever challenges our lives will be thrown at us along our journey. However, we shouldn't just be only flexible physically, but most importantly, mentally and emotionally, because having a flexible body alone wouldn't help us succeed in facing our life's endeavors without stable mental and emotional aspects.
Trying new things was never in my forte and I don't know when will it happen for me to try new things...I am only comfortable in doing the usual things I do...pero grabe talaga bilib ko sayo madam kasi andami mong adventure and also doon sa mas pinili mo CAT kesa sa iba
Tuhod ko po ay nangatog din hahaha it's nice to have flexible body and yung fact na you know your strength in terms of your physical aspect (like being lightweight and have long legs) because it's a strength that you'll be able to use for your adventure. I am not a sporty person- I have weak stamina, mabagal din tumakbo, and less ang physical activities kasi sakitin ako but I guess something I can say good with my body is I dance. I love to dance so much and most ppl tell me lambot daw katawan ko tho naheheya ako every time sinsabi nila yan ahhshah
That picture of you hanging on to a cliff with one arm stretched out gave me severe goosebumps 🥶 this goes beyond flexibility, it's the total absence of acrophobia.
I used to be flexible when I was a kid because I played outdoors a lot but I lost that ability as I grew older and now I am left with only long legs that aren't flexible 😆
Flexible body and longer legs...that's amazing Janeeeeeyyyyyy. You sure know how to look good and enjoy beautiful scenery darling. I would love to do bouldering with you as we climb the wall together.
Oh my God, I suddenly realised that my life was boring after reading your article. 🤣 A lot of things I wasted as I don't have any flexibility. I always thought that doing such things only makes my body tired and exhausted and so I never tried to add some extra adventure in my entire life. However you are indeed have that kind of amazing flexibility as it shows how far you can go with your perseverance. You are indeed an adventurous young lady. Anyway always keep safe in any adventure your gonna do.
Alam mo teh hindi ko talaga kaya yung mag stand sa pinaka tuktok ng hill or rock eme eme. May fear of heights po kasi ako. Kahit sa building, nalulula ako. Haha.
Trying new things was never in my forte and I don't know when will it happen for me to try new things...I am only comfortable in doing the usual things I do...pero grabe talaga bilib ko sayo madam kasi andami mong adventure and also doon sa mas pinili mo CAT kesa sa iba