I take requests

In an email chain going a little further into my 80/20/10 theory Paul says..

"This would make an excellent blog post"

Here it is. ;)




Here is the exact spot I started thinking about the 80/20/10 theory.

I sat for 20 min on this clearing and talked myself into acceptance with stopping here and turning around. The summit bid takes a dramatic turn for the most difficult portion of the climb right here and I "knew" it was going to be "impossible" for me to make it. After a long spell of thinking I came to realize this exact spot is a place I've been a thousand times in my life. It is so easy for me to outperform the bottom 80% it shouldn't even be fair to them.

You could put me on an island with 100 random people and give us all a task and bet you last dollar on the fact that I (at any point in my life) will finish in the top 20%. Easy money bet.

But that day was different I somehow became aware of the idea of how much of a relative cop out it is for me to always stop here. Like I said it's very easy for me so in a way I've done a lot of things that were ironically "equal" even the bottom 10%...they were not trying very hard either. :(

Not sure if it was the elevation or other factors but I slowly decided I could not stop here. I didn't really think going on would result in making the summit I just had to go further for further sake. I just really didn't want to be 80% guy anymore...I was getting pissed off to be honest, and not about this climb but past endeavors that I should have probably done better at. I had accepted besting 80% and giving myself a little high five all too often. I could have stopped at that clearing knowing that the story of climbing to 13,000 feet would be enough to get that normal 20% spot I was used to. Even the rare 10% of people I would meet up with would not be enough to bother me because I could still take comfort in performing better than most. That day I decided to just go further....that's all just further.

One thing led to another and I made the summit.

I'll say this much, and it's the most important thing I took from the entire experience:

I did believe in the clearing that me making the summit from there on that day was impossible. I was sure of that and accepted it as fact. An hour or 2 later I was looking down at the previously "impossible". That is the moment where something changed for me watching myself do the impossible. Had I thought I might be able to do it I could not have accomplished the same thing.

I believed it was impossible for me and then I did it anyway. Maybe is was all the senses working that amplified it and literally standing on top of it was more than symbolic.

So there it is...the start of my 80/20/10 theory.

14ers are not the thing of course it could have been anything, it was just my thing. 14ers are not EPIC events...it was just epic for me at that point in time. It's all relative.

New gym membership

Monthly dues: $0.00
Crowds: None
Equipment/ machines available: The "stair climber" is always open.
Parking available: Tons..it's in a parking garage (free parking).

I read that the best training simulation one Denali expedition crew uses is climbing flights of stairs. Above is a pic of where I will be spending many hours between now and next summers 14er climb. :) I've only made two trips to the stairs so far but in those short sessions it's obvious that I should have climbed a few thousand flights before my last 14er...under training was a serious mistake I made (won't make it again). I suffered more than I had to getting up.

I'm going into my next climb 20X's more prepared than I was for Handies. I will take the lessons learned/mistakes made and make the corrections necessary to take my climbing to the next level. When I step onto the trail head next time I'll have the satisfaction of knowing I'm prepared and that the glitches I'm aware of will have answers at the ready.

By the way if you haven't climbed 20, 30+ flights of real stairs lately, maybe go see what it feels like.;)

Paid with pork chops

Not exactly, it was more like a tip/gift but a customer gave me these pork chops yesterday from part of a MASSIVE pork chop cook off they were having. I tasted them but couldn't really dig into them at that time. No worries...around my house somebody will always be ready to eat and the chops found a happy home in no time. :)

Training is going well and I will be making a % bump up next week. I'm getting a lot stronger however the effort isn't. I'm starting to realize it's coming back to the mental side of things. The early stages are so much more mental than physical as you are developing new habits and learning to deal with the types of changes that can serve you for the rest of your life... Doing something like a 6 week cabbage soup diet is mentally easy...(probably physically hard with hunger, sickness, weakness, etc..)but it's a no brainer. You just follow the directions and you're done.

Re-learning how to eat in a healthy/clean way involves mental work on the first level of figuring it out as well as another less talked about level of changing your habits. Food is another addiction and you can't simply replace ice cream with carrot sticks for a "presto chango" instant healthy lifestyle makeover. There are some deep discussions you have to have with yourself.

I am finding the same thing with exercise/training. It does not get easier when you get stronger (for me anyway). It's about the mental aspect and I don't have the words for it yet. Words like acceptance don't work because they sound too much like a grieving process... I think what is happening is like other habits/rituals. At some point you stop thinking about the why or how and this is something you just do because "it's what you do". The notion of it getting physically easier when I got stronger/lighter/faster is turning out to be like youthful daydreaming or wishful thinking. It aint getting any easier and I know the further I go the harder it gets every time I take the next step. The mental joke is looking out a year ahead and calculating the increases.....uhmm yeah. ;O

I was reading a story about a rock climber who climbed a route called Magic Mushroom in 24 hours. The story details the climb but it goes in depth on the type of work this guy had to put in to pull it off. It goes over the exhaustive prep work and pre-climbing of sections he did. A team climb (as a test run of the route), his next failed attempt at it, and finally his successful run. They gave a lot of detail on the work it took and it was very time consuming and supremely difficult. These are the types of things people do that live in the upper 10%. When you make up your mind to get closer to the top 10% you have to realize what demands the universe is going to put on you to get there.

I've got a long thought process that goes over the bottom 80%, the top 20%, 10% theory that I've been working on I'll save for another day but the gist of it is this:

Getting the the top 20% of an endeavor is something I have found very easy to do in life. It doesn't matter what it is. The reason is that 80% of people are easily bested with near minimal effort. Most people don't like to admit it but they are pathetically minimalistic when it comes to doing things. They will do the absolute minimum allowable by the universe around them. The ABSOLUTE minimum. In many cases like a job or something if you just show up on time with a willingness to try/do/learn you will be outperforming people straight away.

I discovered at an early age that I could rise above most people in most endeavors by applying slightly more effort than them. With a little hustle I have always been able to become part of the upper 20% in the category. This elevated state was enough for me to feel a slight sense of accomplished. The problem with all of that is when you break it down I am still doing what the bottom 80% do.. slightly more, a little more effort...and stopping right there at the threshold of "better than".

The upper 10% are much different!

They seem to be operating amongst/against themselves. Slightly more and a little better do not enter into their thought processes. They are after the most, the best, the biggest. This difference in perspective shoots them far out above the 10% below them and into a different galaxy from the bottom 80%. These people are perceived as insane often because...well they are literally operating in a different world most of the time. This 10% world does not operate and revolve around the things most people take for granted as "normal" or the way things work.

Anyway...I'm rambling on, My point is easier is not something I see ahead of me from where I am now. I've traveled a fair way from back there to here, I see there is a longer trail ahead of me, and I notice some big hills ahead on the trail.....it's going to take more effort than before to get over those hills. I think over the horizon there are even bigger hills:

Bottom 80% would not have made it this far.

Top 20% would get over the next series of hills to get a big enough lead over the others to claim a victory and stop there with a comfortable lead.

Top 10% are looking forward to seeing what the trail will offer over the biggest hill they can see far off in the distance....what will be next after that? The are not looking where they are in relation to the 80% or even the 10% below them because nobody else but the top 10% are still in the game at this point. All they have is themselves and each other to high five over the next hill.


I've been a 20%er most of my life but I've got my eyes on the back of the 10%ers heads on the trail in front of me....I think I might be able to catch up to them if I keep at it. They are having all the fun up there.