Descending Hubris

“Descending Hubris” from the original Blog, The Heights of Hubris (Thanks to Page and Jones and Bonham and Plant for the poetry, it’s in quotes).

There was a mountain.  I didn’t know where it was.  I had heard talk of it.  I didn’t realize it was even a mountain at the time.  It certainly wasn’t presented for what it was.  But I saw and heard and wanted to find it.  I wanted to be a part of that group that had made it to the mountain, those that worshiped at it’s feet.  I still didn’t know it was a mountain…I certainly didn’t know I would have to climb it.

So, I started looking.  What was it?  I saw people that were there.  I didn’t realize it at the time, but most of them were talking from the top.  They made it to the top, and they were never coming back.

But man, I sure liked the things I heard.  Some, they were kind and loving, or so it appeared, right?  Some, they weren’t very kind, and they were proud of it.  Part of me, a large part if I am honest, identified with this group better.  Oh, sure, I could see how the kind and loving ones could get a lot more done, but that didn’t really seem as fun to me.  I know, I know, but it really does get worse.

So I kept looking for the mountain that I didn’t know existed.  I really dug and dug, I asked questions, I read what so many had said.  I read and I read and I listened and I looked.  I found that the things these people said really seemed to make SENSE.  It was logical, it was rational, it was the “right” things to think about.  It was the “sensible” thing to do.  Hell, these people were actually revered and lauded for their influence and their wisdom and their righteousness.  What a joke that turned out to be….but I digress.

I found three places that these people seemed to congregate.  One was the church.  In fact, of all the places I found this influence, it was most powerful, and most dangerous, in the church.  Because here, as so many have said before, HERE was the opiate for the masses.  HERE was the power to affect and control not only a man’s life, but HERE was the power to control his THOUGHTS.  Man, that was power, and it scared me a little until I realized that this was the place to start if you were going to find the mountain.

The second place was the Academy.  It took me a long time to find this one, but it certainly rivaled the influence of the church.  In fact, in a grander sense, the Academy was MORE powerful than the church, but I wasn’t as interested in the grand sense, I was interested in the very small circle I found myself in.  I wasn’t worried about the rest of the world.  Frankly, I was too lazy.

Third, I found the world of politics.  This world of politics I found first, actually.  But the world of politics, which is really nothing more than saying the world of economic politics, became a haven for me of sorts.  But as I wandered I realized that if I were to truly find that for which I was so desperately searching I would have to distance myself from the common rabble.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention.  As I was making these discoveries, I realized that what REALLY set these men apart was the fact that they had risen above the common man.  In some ways, this lead me to the mountain, but I am getting ahead of myself.

I knew now that there was something that had a height to it.  I didn’t know how high, I didn’t know why it was so high, but I knew it was there.  I started looking at the men that I knew were already at this height.  They were all men that were respected by most, if not a little bit disdained at the same time.  Of course this didn’t matter, I knew that this disdain was something that I could live with.  I guess you could say its in the blood.

Then I saw it.  I saw the mountain.  I didn’t see it for what it was, but I saw the mountain.  And I knew that it was what I was looking for.  I don’t really know how I knew, I just knew that all the people that I have looked up to were either already there, or that is where they were heading.  A funny thing happened.  Once I started walking that road, it was easy.  There were people to help.  In fact, there were some that encouraged me.  I heard whispers that I could actually be one of the few to climb the mountain, as terrible as the climb might be. 

I got to the mountain and saw all those at it’s feet.  It was a beautiful mountain.  Just like any mountain you have ever seen.  It’s high, and green and beautiful with a crown of snow and cloud.  It looked majestic, it looked good, it looked right, and most of all, there was power in the mountain.  Power of mind and power of spirit.  Man, I was home and I needed to climb.  Oh, some told me I wasn’t ready, but what they really meant was they weren’t ready.  But make no mistake, I was ready.

Have you ever climbed a mountain?  I don’t mean a rock face, I mean a mountain. Starting at thebottom, where the stream runs smooth and clean.  It’s usually pretty warm and the ground is basically flat and starts to slope upward.  It’s trying, but it’s invigorating.  Then, as you move from base camp you start the switchback.  It’s fun, you think.  Man, this is GOOD for me.  And you keep going.  You keep moving.  Maybe there are some with you.  They cramp up, they collapse.  You try and help them up, but the mountain gets the better of them.  And we tell ourselves for so long that the harder it is the better it is for us.  We need to keep pushing, what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.  So we look for the challenge, and we stop trying to help those that have fallen.  We stop using the switchback.  We start climbing straight up, because, you see, the harder it is, the better.  I never stopped to think that maybe it’s just hard.  Maybe, just maybe, there is no real reward at the end.  Or worse.  But I kept climbing. 

And I kept leaving people in my wake.

When you climb a high mountain, you reach a point where the trees thin out.  They can’t grow up there any more.  This should be some indication that what the mountain is really about is not good, or at least its not a place that you should be.  I don’t think about it that way.  I look around, and I realize, there are people just under the tree line.  They look up and I am lauded.  Finally, there is the recognition of others of what I have seen in myself.  There is no real admiration of who I am, there is certainly not any real love, not from them, they have almost lost that ability at this point.  They are envious.  They know that they can not make it past the trees, so they surrender to that fact and console themselves with the fact that they have made it further than most of the rabble at the foot of the mountain, not to mention those fools out there that don’t even know there is a damned mountain in the first place.  Fools.

When you get past the trees something else starts to happen.  You start to really have trouble breathing. And it’s cold.  It could be 90 degrees at the bottom, but it’s icy up here.  The snow never really melts all the way up here.  And you think to yourself, what am I doing here?  That’s what I kept asking myself.  I certainly paid for it.  I certainly left a lot of myself on the way up.  You have to, you can’t take it all with you to the top.  It can’t survive up there. 

You get past the trees, and you look up.  And it’s right there.  The top, the peak, it’s right there.  Maybe 10-15 minutes ahead.  So you start to hurry, and you climb some more.  And an hour goes by, and the peak doesn’t look any closer.  The false peaks.  The idea that the next 10,000 feet are harder than the first 20,000. And you look up, and you look down.  There is no way you go down.  No way.  You can’t, all those at the trees won’t understand, and worse, they will think you were the coward that couldn’t face the top.

“There are two paths that you can go by, and sure, there is still time to change the road you’re on”, but you know, you know before you even ask the question what road you will take.  Is it really a choice if you already know which one you will choose?

And you climb.  And you stare at the snow.  And nothing matters but the next step.  You even stop thinking about why you are climbing, all you are is climbing.  There is no one.  You are the only one that really matters any more.  There isn’t another soul in sight.  You don’t rest, you just wind on down that road (or should I say up).  Then, you’re there.

“And there walks a lady we all know who shines white light and wants to show how everything still turns to gold.  And if you listen very hard the truth will come to you at last when all are one and one is all to be a rock and not to roll”. 

This is Hubris she says. 

It’s what you have been looking for.  This is the top of the mountain.  You look out across the sky and you see the other mountains.  You see Riches, you see Fame, you see Glory, you see Honor.  They are all very beautiful, but they all pale in comparison to the mountain you have climbed.  None of them even come close to your Hubris.  All that she says is sort of lost, except that it certainly sounds good.  It is certainly all you thought it would be, and more.

You turn back and you start to look around.  There aren’t a whole lot of people up there at first glance. 

Then, as you start to pay attention, you realize that the top is full of people.  But they are all hard and cold, and bitter.  They look around at one another and they are either focused on the road up, or they are focused on the people on the ground, or they are just sitting there.  There are the ones you see from the bottom without knowing that they are on the mountain.  Oh, you know them.  You see them.  They try to tell you how they have it all figured out.  Some of them are really good at it.  You try to talk to them, ask them why they care so much, but they don’t even really acknowledge you at first.  They seem to just be solely focused on those that are still on the ground.  Those that don’t even know the mountain is here.  Then you start to recognize some of them.  You remember, these are the ones that you saw down there.  They are the reason I am here.  No, wait, that’s not true.  And you panic.  And you look around, and you see that the reason you didn’t see the people before, the reason you thought you were alone at the top is because they all have started to look like the mountain.  In fact, there are stones, huge stones that look like they were dropped there by God.  And you realize, they are the ones that came to the top before.  You realize that the ones standing there, YOU and all the others, they are herebecause they are standing on those that have come before….

And you realize that Hubris is built on those that came before.  Some of the ones that are there today are barely able to walk around.  They don’t look around.   They certainly don’t look over the side anymore.  They just sit there.  So, I ask.  Why are they just sitting there?  Hey, you over there.  I saw you when I was down there.  I saw the things you said and did. I followed you here.  He looks at me and says, you know that’s not true.  And I panic again, because I know he is right.

You can’t blame me for being here.  Just like I can’t blame him for being here, as he points to one of the rocks…. I can barely tell, but I can tell, he used to be one of us.  Did I say before that I was in a panic?  I was.

The guy I was talking to, he realizes what I am doing.  He says, you know, you’re here, that means you had what it takes to be here.  That means there is a reason you’re here.  I ask him what that might be…

I don’t know.  All I know is that I have done everything in my power to get here, and I have all this power and I have all this influence, and I love it.  It’s what I do.  And if you think about it, I can help those people down there.

Help them do what, I ask. “Help them live a better life.  Help them to be what they should be.”  How do you know what that is I ask.  He says, “because I know.  I’m on the mountain, aren’t I?” 

You can’t really argue with that point.

Then he says something that I didn’t understand at first.  He says, “plus, if I don’t convince them to follow me up here, I can’t get any higher…”

I like the view, I like the influence, and after everything is said and done, everyone that I have ever looked up to is on the mountain, or was before they turned to stone.  So I think to myself, sure, there is an isolation here at the top, but it’s worth it right?  This is the place I should be.  After all, I paid the price by climbing the mountain.  I know what it is these people should be. I know how they should live their lives.  They are beneath me….literally.  After the panic dies, I settle down on the mountain.  It’s kind of cold up here.  No one is really all that close to you up there.  But it’s worth it.  All the pain and the blood, all the sacrifice, it’s worth it.  Sure.

But as I spent more time on the mountain, years in fact, I began to look around.  I realized that I didn’t like the company I was in.  I remember thinking when I was down below that I was doing all of this for a “good” reason.  I wanted to “change things”.  I felt like I was destined to make it to the top of the mountain.  Because, I thought, from there, wherever there was, I could have the influence to affect some change.  Make people live a life that is more in keeping with what it is that I decided would be best for them.  In fact for quite a few years, I had done just that.  Or at least I thought I had.  Then I started trying to influence more people.  In fact, some of the “rabble” asked me to guide them.  Some of them actually came to me and said, “we want you to tell us what it is that we should be thinking and doing.” 

So I did.  I spent quite a while doing that.  And I started to panic again…

I began to look around again.  I began to realize that this mountain that I had chosen, Hubris, it wasn’t where I needed to be.  In fact, I realized one day that the entire mountain, all 30,000 feet of it, was nothing more than the remains of men’s lives that were destroyed for the building of it.  Sure, they only had themselves to blame. They lured other men here with their influence and their words, but those men, just like me, wanted to be a part of Hubris, whether we admitted it or not.  Those that opposed us, we humiliated them.  We dragged them behind our chariots screaming to Priam, “No! I will not stop this madness.”  Only to realize, as we gaze around that our own death was prophesied by the very stones around us.  You don’t know panic until you realize that you are standing on the top of a mountain with nothing but stones around you.   You realize that there is no life here.  There is no death here.  There is only Hubris.

So I asked my fellow stone.  I say, “has anyone ever left the mountain?”

He looks at me.  He looks at me in a way that measures me and asks two questions, neither of which I had the courage to answer at the time.  He says first, “Are you sure you were supposed to be here?” Then he asks me, “Why would anyone want to leave Hubris?  Every fiber of our being was needed to get here.  How could we just leave?  We belong here, it’s in our nature to be here.  It’s what makes us different from them.”  And as he pointed to the bottom of the mountain, the look in his eye told me everything.  I needed to get off the mountain.  Maybe I was no different from him.  But I felt like I had to try.  I had to see if I could get off the mountain.  I had to see if I could walk back down and never look back.

I started asking around.  I started trying to see if anyone had ever gotten off the mountain.  I found a very old stone, barely alive and asked him.  Surely he had been here for so long.  He would know.  So I asked him.

“Sure, there have been plenty that have come off the mountain.  It used to happen all the time.  Not so much anymore.”  Why I asked….

“I am not sure, but I can guess.  Maybe it’s because they don’t see any point anymore.  You see, there used to be a lot of people on the ground that knew about the mountain but didn’t really want anything to do with it. In fact, they saw those on the mountain as evil.  I think they are still out there, but they don’t have as much influence any more.  I guess it’s because Hubris is so high.  It’s hard to argue with  power and size of this magnitude….it’s just too attractive for those on the ground.  Oh, there are some that try to talk you out of it.  But usually these folks are vilified by those ON the mountain, but mostly by those heading TO the mountain.  Why go back to that?  No, but people still make it off the mountain, every now and then, but they don’t go the way they came.  They go that way….”  and he pointed towards the north.  After all the years I had been up here, I had never been to the north side of Hubris.  But as I approached, I looked over the edge.  I saw it wasn’t the same mountain on this side.  There was a drop of about 15,000 feet, at least that was my guess at the time because I couldn’t really see the bottom.  I turned around and asked him, why would anyone go this way.  His answer made me realize that I had never known fear until this day….

“Because, son, they are too scared to face the people on the way down because of the way they came up.”

All of a sudden I realized what he meant.  And I realized that I had the same fear.  In fact, that fear, after all was said and done, was the only thing keeping me on this mountain.  I also realized what it was to want to cast yourself off of the north face.  I spent a lot of time near that edge.  Funny thing is, I didn’t even have the courage to jump off.  Funny what things we see in life that take more courage than we have.  They are not always the right things either.

I kept trying to influence those on the ground.  I still had my place to teach.  I still had that influence, but I stopped trying to convince them to follow me to Hubris.  I started trying to show why Hubris is evil and why there is nothing at the top but cold and lonely stone.  Then a funny thing happened.  Those that were on Hubris, and those that were on their way, they started to hate me.  No one on Hubris will actively try to throw another off the North Face.  None of them have the time really.  But they can make life bad enough to want to jump.  But there is no real answer there, not for me anyway.  There never really was, if I am honest with myself.  To be what I needed and wanted to be, I had to walk down the way I came up.  But that was actually, at this point, more fearful than the North Face.  Infinitely so.

I stopped trying to influence anyone anymore.  I realized that once I renounced Hubris, it was impossible to have any credibility while I was standing on his Peak.  But I didn’t come down.  I couldn’t.  Who could face those people.  The ones at the tree line?  The ones at the foot, the worshipers of Hubris and it’s inhabitants?  Who in the world would have the courage to do that?  Certainly not me.  I sat on Hubris, for a long time.  I don’t remember how long.  Trying to think.  Then I looked around and I realized that this is what Hubris is all about.  Those that realize Hubris for what it is.  They don’t have the courage to face the North, but they certainly don’t have the courage to face the Descent.  The one leads to death, the other leads to the death of Hubris, and with him goes Pride.  In the end, I realized that what fueled the ascent, and what fueled the stay on the mountain was Pride.  Pride lives inside of you like a virus.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not something you catch.  It’s something that was already there.  We all have it. But those that start up the mountain, hell, those that take their first step towards it, they start to cultivate Pride.  It’s like a mushroom, a deadly poisoned mushroom that becomes the parasite that eats you to the shell you become while you are at the top.  It becomes everything that you are.  You no longer can call yourself your own.  You have cultivated a person that is nothing but Pride.  And Hubris is the perfect place to solidify your crop of Pride.  In fact, you have so much, and you can produce so much, you can pass it out on the street corner for free.  Look around, there are a lot of people that have ever even heard mention of Hubris and yet they too are full of Pride.  Where did they get it?  Now you know. Oh, by the way, you feed Pride the same way you feed a mushroom.  Give it enough darkness, give it enough crap, it flourishes like you wouldn’t believe.  You end up with so much you HAVE to give it away….and you do.  But don’t worry, you always have more where that came from….

I also had a most frightening realization about my Pride.  I realized that the man I spoke to when I first arrived, the man I knew from before I found the mountain, the man I had spoken to for so long, the only friend I had on the mountain, if you can call anyone on the mountain a friend, I realized he didn’t exist.  I realized he was me.  From the very beginning, the strongest pull I had to the mountain was inside of me.

It was Pride that had shown me the thing that I wanted to be.  It showed me the influence I could have.

Once I got to the mountain, I wasn’t surprised to see the one I had longed to be like for so long.  The irony is, I didn’t even realize it was me I was staring and talking to the entire time.  I was the reason I was there.

So here I sit on top of the mountain.  It’s my last day here.  Either way, I’m going to leave this mountain.  I look over the north face.  It looks beautiful.  But it’s the view.  I bet it looks beautiful from the ground too.  But there has never been any escape there.  I have always known that.  And I regret all those that have found their escape there.  The demons are still there on the way down.  And from what I can tell, you never stop falling, and you never stop hearing them scream as you fly by.  No, that’s no way to go.  Then I heard a voice, and it sounded like my own, but different of course.  It said this…

“Yes, there are two paths you can go by

But in the long run

There’s still time to change

The road you’re on.”

Then I look around.  I still see why I came here to begin with.  I still see all that made this place desirable.  But I know it’s a lie.  And if I stay, all I will become is a stone for another man to climb on his way to Hubris.  I can’t do it.

I am starting on my way down.  I have to believe that there have been others that have done it.  I have read stories that sound like they must have been to the Heights of Hubris and returned.  And as I take my first step I realize there is one with me.  He has been there the whole time.  He has known me from the beginning.  He is the one that made it so hard coming up.  He was the one that was telling me that this was never the place for me, or for anyone.  I look at him, and he says that he will go with me back down.  He also tells me that it’s not important what they say as I go by.  He tells me that he knows I have been preparing for this journey since I got here.  No, he’s not part of Hubris.  He has just come to help me on my way down.  As I look at him again I ask him, “What happens when I get to the ground?”

“You don’t need to worry about what happens when you get to the ground.  I will still be there doing all I can to help you on your way.  I always have, and I always will.”

And so, I begin Descending Hubris.

“And as we wind on down the road

Our shadows taller than our soul

There walks a lady we all know

Who shines white light and wants to show

How everything still turns to gold

And if you listen very hard

The truth will come to you at last

When all are one and one is all

To be a rock and not to roll”

But I know, it’s no longer the rock I want to be and all I want to do is keep rolling.