But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. Isaiah 40:31

"I do not fear to die, that pang is past. God raises my weakness, and gives me courage to endure the worst. I leave a sad and bitter world; and if you remember me, and think of me as of one unjustly condemned, I am resigned to the fate awaiting me. Learn from me, dear lady, to submit in patience to the will of Heaven!"~~Justine Moritz

[M]y religious belief teaches me to feel as safe in battle as in bed. God has fixed the time for my death. I do not concern myself about that, but to be always ready, no matter when it may overtake me. That is the way all men should live, and then all would be equally brave.

I have always loved the quote from John F. Kennedy: “When written in Chinese, the word <i>crisis</i> is composed of two characters. One represents danger and the other represents opportunity.”
Looking back on my life, I can see that I have never had a crisis that didn’t make me stronger. And here was all that I loved before me: great risk, but also great opportunity.
I had never felt so excited.
Neil was already preparing to come back up. Mick, so fortunate to be alive, was staying firmly, and wisely, at base camp.
But for me, my time had come.
That evening, camp two was again full of friends. Neil and Geoffrey were there along with Michael and Graham, Karla and Alan. But the weariness of coming back up to camp two again oozed painfully from Karla’s gaunt face.
She was utterly exhausted, and you could see it.
Who wouldn’t be after three months on Everest, and having got within four hundred feet of the summit only days earlier?
Tomorrow the biggest battle of our lives would begin.

There's a long road of suffering ahead of you. But don't lose courage. You've already escaped the gravest danger: selection. So now, muster your strength, and don't lose heart. We shall all see the day of liberation. Have faith in life. Above all else, have faith. Drive out despair, and you will keep death away from yourselves. Hell is not for eternity. And now, a prayer - or rather, a piece of advice: let there be comradeship among you. We are all brothers, and we are all suffering the same fate. The same smoke floats over all our heads. Help one another. It is the only way to survive.

Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be men of courage; be strong. 1 CORINTHIANS 16:13 SEPTEMBER 19 We live in an insecure world. Your body is no more secure than your ability to resist disease and infection. Accidents can happen to anyone at any time. This world is insecure. Yet you should never come to the point where you say, “Life is over for me; I am through. I can’t do anything anymore. I haven’t any confidence; I have no sense of security.” Remember that the Lord is faithful. He will strengthen you and guard you against all evil. Don’t live with too much caution. It may seem strange that a man would stand in a pulpit and advocate throwing yourself into life, even at the risk of getting hurt. But I have observed that people who try to keep from getting hurt never amount to anything. Only those who throw themselves into risky circumstances — regardless of whether they may get hurt — become really great people. When you live daringly, you do many stupid things; you often make a fool of yourself and people criticize you; and you may fail at one thing and another; but in the long run, you will accomplish great things.

As your days, so shall your strength be.’ When I’m lying awake the night before having to make one of those speeches, I say that to myself. It reassures me.” “What does that mean to you, that text?” “That when the trials of life come, you’ll be given the strength to cope with them, day by day. So often I’ve thought at the start of a dreaded day — having to defend my Ph.D. thesis, giving a talk to an intimidating audience, or even just going to the dentist! — ‘Well, of course, I shall get through this because I have to. I will find the strength. And, anyway, by this time tomorrow it will be over.

The wind came back with triple fury, and put out the light for the last time. They sat in company with the others in other shanties, their eyes straining against crude walls and their souls asking if He meant to measure their puny might against His. They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.

We never know how high we are
Till we are called to rise;
And then, if we are true to plan,
Our statures touch the skies.

The heroism we recite
Would be a daily thing,
Did not ourselves the cubits warp
For fear to be a king.

There is no immortality that is not built on friendship and work done with care. All the secrets of the world worth knowing are hiding in plain sight. It takes forty-one seconds to climb a ladder three stories tall. It's not easy to imagine the year 3012, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try. We have new capabilities now — strange powers we're still getting used to. The mountains are a message from Aldrag the Wyrm-Father. Your life must be an open city with all sorts of ways to wander in.

After that, the book will fade, the way all books fade in your mind. But I hope you will remember this:

A man walking fast down a dark lonely street. Quick steps and hard breathing, all wonder and need. A bell above the door and the tinkle it makes. A clerk and a ladder and warm golden light, and then: the right book exactly, at exactly the right time.

Survival is staying alive one breath at a time. p. 251

At the end of the ridge we leaned on our ice axes and looked up.
Above us was the legendary Hillary Step, the forty-foot ice wall that formed one of the mountain’s most formidable hurdles.
Cowering from the wind, I tried to make out a route up it.
This ice face was to be our final and hardest test. The outcome would determine whether we would join those few who have touched that hallowed ground above.
If so, I would become only the thirty-first British climber ever to have done this.
The ranks were small.
I started up cautiously. It was a long way to come to fall here.
Points in. Ice axe in. Test them. Then move.
It was slow progress, but it was progress. And steadily I moved up the ice.
I had climbed steep pitches like this so many times before, but never twenty-nine thousand feet up in the sky. At this height, in this rarefied thin air, and with 40 mph of wind trying to blow us off the ice, I was struggling. Again.
I stopped and tried to steady myself.
Then I made that old familiar mistake — I looked down.
Beneath me, either side of the ridge, the mountain dropped away into abysses.
<i>Idiot, Bear.</i>
I tried to refocus on only what was in front of me and above.
<i>Up. Keep moving up.</i>
So I kept climbing.
It was the climb of my life, and nothing was going to stop me.

In the face of our common dangers, in this wintr of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come.

"The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice — though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do — determined to save
the only life you could save."