Uphill Running Quotes

A man's sorrow runs uphill; true it is difficult for him to bear, but it is also difficult for him to keep.

The fragility of crystal is not a weakness but a fineness. My parents understood that fine crystal glass had to be cared for or may be shattered. But when it came to my brother, they didn’t seem to know or care that their course of their secret action brought the kind of devastation that could cut them. Their fraudulent marriage and our father’s denial of his other son was for Chris a murder of every day’s truth. He felt his whole life turned like a river suddenly reversing the direction of its flow. Suddenly running uphill. These revelations struck at the core of Chris’s sense of identity. They made his entire childhood seem like fiction. Chris never told them he knew and made me promise silence as well.

you have to keep upping the ante: run farther, run faster, run uphill. If you don’t keep pushing and pushing and pushing some more, the body will settle into homeostasis, albeit at a different level than before, and you will stop improving. This

I don't correct her to let her know her backdoor wisdom yanks me deep into another country, where water runs uphill.

Uphill? There's nothing up the hill," Colly said, trying desperately to work out where this conversation was going. "As a matter of fact, there is. There's a bluff about twelve meters high, with a river running below it. The water's deep, so it'll be quite safe for you to jump." In his brief glimpse of the river, Halt had noticed that the fast-flowing water cut under the bluff in a sharp curve. That should mean that the bottom had been scoured out over the years. A thought struck him. "You can swim, I assume?" "Yes. I can swim," Colly said. "But I'm going jumping off some bluff just because you say to!" "No, no. Of course not. That'd be asking far too much of you. You'll jump off because if you don't, I'll shoot you. It'll be the same effect, really. If I have to shoot you, you'll fall off. But I thought I'd give you a chance to survive." Halt paused, then added, "Oh, and if you decide to run downhill, I'll also shoot you with an arrow. Uphill and off is really your only chance of survival." "You can't be serious!" Colly said. "Do you really-" But he got no further. Halt leaned forward, putting a hand up to stop the outburst. "Colly, take a good, long look into my eyes and tell me if you see anything, anything at all, that says I'm not deadly serious." His eyes were deep brown, almost black. They were steady and unwavering and there was no sign of anything there but utter determination. Colly looked at them and after a few second, his eyes dropped away. halt nodded as the other man's gaze slid away from his. "Good. Now we've got that settled, you should try to get some sleep. You have a big day ahead of you tomorrow.

that ambition didn’t always run uphill. Sometimes, when you were happy, it jogged in place.

Imagine your kid is running into the street and you have to sprint after her in bare feet," Eric told me when I picked up my training with him after my time with Ken. "You'll automatically lock into perfect form--you'll be up on your forefeet, with your back erect, head steady, arms high, elbows driving, and feet touching down quickly on the forefoot and kicking back toward your butt." You can't run uphill powerfully with poor biomechanics," Eric explained.

In extreme old age you suddenly find you are unable to run uphill, two buckets full of hen food are heavier than they were and the cheerful scream of hearing aids, provided they are working, is a welcome sound. Other things go wrong. Paddy Leigh Fermor, aged ninety-four came to stay, got into the bath, looked down at the tap end and to his dismay saw that both feet had turned black. ‘Oh God,’ he thought, ‘Teeth, ears and eyes are wonky and now my feet.’ He need not have worried. he had got into the bath with his socks on.

But he liked it all, that was his secret. He saw how fleeting it would all be, how quickly the kids went through the different phases, and how once those small things were gone, they never returned. A walking child never crawled again. So secretly, it was okay with him. Rachel loved her children, he was sure of that, but she was never natural around them. She was afraid to be alone with them most of the time. She grew impatient if they hung on her or talked too long, always feeling the pull of being elsewhere. Toby could have either or both of them on his lap for hours before even realizing it. At work, he was able to sit with his patients, knowing that this was not a stepping-stone for his life but life itself. Can you imagine what it’s like to have arrived where you want to be at such a young age? That was what she never understood: that ambition didn’t always run uphill. Sometimes, when you were happy, it jogged in place.

He imagines the water running in thick curving lines, like the drawings of the tree’s roots, cutting through stone and spilling over the earth. And then he reverses the flow of water, letting his imagination take over, and he sees the water racing north, uphill, towards the Catskills, weaving around towns, beneath bridges, rushing over stones and cutting through the trees, until it lands at the feet of Alice Pearson, who stands on the shore, looking out at the place where the water meets the sky.

And there is his three-year-old daughter, who runs around wearing nothing but a rhinestone necklace (who wouldn’t, if they could?). She is able to count, in English, methodically as a cart climbing uphill, up to the number fourteen—and then the wheels come off: “Twenty-one!” she screams in delight. “Eighteen! Forty-three! Eleventy! Twine!

I was concious of Zach's breathing, his shirt pulled across his chest, one arm draped on the steering wheel. The hard, dark look of it. The mystery of his skin. It was foolish to think some things were beyond happening, even being attracted to Negroes. I'd honestly thought such a thing couldn't happen, the way water could nog run uphill or salt could not taste sweet. A law of nature.

Where is the fun in running on flat ground? Let’s go uphill! Even if your heart feels like bursting and your lungs are burning, the view will be absolutely glorious from the top...this I promise you.

It was foolish to think some things were beyond happening, even being attracted to Negroes. I’d honestly thought such a thing couldn’t happen, the way water could not run uphill or salt could not taste sweet. A law of nature. Maybe it was a simple matter of being attracted to what I couldn’t have.

What’ll happen is,” Alex McClean advises, “is you’ll get hammer’d paying double taxes, visits all the time from Sheriffs of both provinces looking for their quitrents, tax collectors from Philadelphia and Annapolis, and sooner or later you’ll have to decide just to get it up on some Logs, and roll it, one way or the other. Depends how your Property runs, I’d guess.” “. . . as North is pretty much up-hill,” Mr. Price is reckoning,” ’twould certainly not be as easy, to roll her up into Pennsylvania, as down into Maryland.” “Where I am no longer your Wife,” she reminds him. “Aye, and there’s another reason,” he nods soberly. “Well then, let’s fetch the Boys and get to it,— ’tis Maryland, ho!

However, when the circumstances in front of you are too overwhelming, you may turn around and run away. The battle appears to be all uphill and impossible and for what? You feel like the relationship holds no guarantee. Especially, if you’ve already been through a lot in your life, it may not seem worth it to fight through the chaos for the possibility of true love.

What is this mysterious masculine force which spurs you onwards, whence comes this will, this heroic initiative which seems to precede the start of the great journey? This is what prevents you turning back on the path. If you were to do so, if you failed to travel the path to its end, you would be guilty, because the practices of your initiation have mobilised enormous forces which destroy men and drive them insane if they are not aimed in the right direction. The signs will help you open a way for yourself in the virgin forest where no roads exist. 'Even the Gods are your enemies; because their impersonal lives are at risk in this war. You will have to overcome the Archetypes, dethrone them, reincorporating their tremendous numinous energies within yourself. Do you remember the Greek legend? Man was a circular androgynous. He began to roll up Mount Olympus. The Gods were frightened, fearing defeat, and so they resorted to artifice: they divided the man-sphere in half. The result was that he was so busy trying to find his other half that he had no time to make war with them. But, luckily, the Gods made a mistake. Because one day we will bring them back to life as well, giving them a face. 'When the water runs downhill, it gives rise to Samsara and human generations, to the circular movement of the involuted earth; when it runs uphill, the opposite direction, it provokes the mutation of the Gods themselves, the divinisation of the hero; it creates a free, eternal race, without Gods, without a king. This is the Road of the Warrior.

About five miles back I had a brush with the CHP. Not stopped or pulled over: nothing routine. I always drive properly. A bit fast, perhaps, but always with consummate skill and a natural feel for the road that even cops recognize. No cop was ever born who isn't a sucker for a finely-executed hi-speed Controlled Drift all the way around one of those cloverleaf freeway interchanges. Few people understand the psychology of dealing with a highway traffic cop. Your normal speeder will panic and immediately pull over to the side when he sees the big red light behind him ... and then he will start apologizing, begging for mercy. This is wrong. It arouses contempt in the cop-heart. The thing to do – when you're running along about 100 or so and you suddenly find a red-flashing CHP-tracker on your tail – what you want to do then is accelerate. Never pull over with the first siren-howl. Mash it down and make the bastard chase you at speeds up to 120 all the way to the next exit. He will follow. But he won't know what to make of your blinker-signal that says you're about to turn right. This is to let him know you're looking for a proper place to pull off and talk ... keep signaling and hope for an off-ramp, one of those uphill side-loops with a sign saying "Max Speed 25" ... and the trick, at this point, is to suddenly leave the freeway and take him into the chute at no less than 100 miles an hour. He will lock his brakes about the same time you lock yours, but it will take him a moment to realize that he's about to make a 180-degree turn at this speed ... but you will be ready for it, braced for the Gs and the fast heel-toe work, and with any luck at all you will have come to a complete stop off the road at the top of the turn and be standing beside your automobile by the time he catches up. He will not be reasonable at first ... but no matter. Let him calm down. He will want the first word. Let him have it. His brain will be in a turmoil: he may begin jabbering, or even pull his gun. Let him unwind; keep smiling. The idea is to show him that you were always in total control of yourself and your vehicle – while he lost control of everything.

he liked it all, that was his secret. He saw how fleeting it would all be, how quickly the kids went through the different phases, and how once those small things were gone, they never returned. A walking child never crawled again. So secretly, it was okay with him. Rachel loved her children, he was sure of that, but she was never natural around them. She was afraid to be alone with them most of the time. She grew impatient if they hung on her or talked too long, always feeling the pull of being elsewhere. Toby could have either or both of them on his lap for hours before even realizing it. At work, he was able to sit with his patients, knowing that this was not a stepping-stone for his life but life itself. Can you imagine what it’s like to have arrived where you want to be at such a young age? That was what she never understood: that ambition didn’t always run uphill. Sometimes, when you were happy, it jogged in place.

It was simply the way with Harry, like waiting for sunrise. But once you made clear that you wouldn't be going to bed with him, he'd look oddly relieved and calm down. And the matter once raised would not be revisited, I will say that for him. He didn't make a nuisance of himself. Funny old skellum. Never dull. There are men whom it is important not to take the slightest notice of when they're talking, if it's after ten o'clock at night and they've had a glass of beer. Harry was one such mammal. They really and truly don't mean to be idiots. But it's like a Roman Catholic person not wanting to feel guilt. Might as well ask water to run uphill. Except that might conceivably be contrived. With a pump. Once, he asked my sister to run away with him, to Rotterdam I think it was. She said no and he asked my brother. That was the most important thing to understand about Harry. Essentially, what he wanted--darling, who wouldn't--was someone to run away with him to Rotterdam. It's what all of us want, isn't it? Of course, nobody gets it. Probably not even those misfortunates who are in Rotterdam already. One wonders where they want to run away to. Crouch End?

TO TRUST ME in more and more areas of your life. Anything that tends to make you anxious is a growth opportunity. Instead of running away from these challenges, embrace them, eager to gain all the blessings I have hidden in the difficulties. If you believe that I am sovereign over every aspect of your life, it is possible to trust Me in all situations. Don’t waste energy regretting the way things are or thinking about what might have been. Start at the present moment—accepting things exactly as they are—and search for My way in the midst of those circumstances. Trust is like a staff you can lean on, as you journey uphill with Me. If you are trusting in Me consistently, the staff will bear as much of your weight as needed. Lean on, trust, and be confident in Me with all your heart and mind. But I am like an olive tree flourishing in the house of God; I trust in God’s unfailing love for ever and ever. —PSALM 52:8 Lean on, trust in, and be confident in the Lord with all your heart and mind and do not rely on your own insight or understanding. In all your ways know, recognize, and acknowledge Him, and He will direct and make straight and plain your paths. —PROVERBS 3:5–6 AMP

In the fall of 2006, I participated in a three-day conference at the Salk Institute entitled Beyond Belief: Science, Religion, Reason, and Survival. This event was organized by Roger Bingham and conducted as a town-hall meeting before an audience of invited guests. Speakers included Steven Weinberg, Harold Kroto, Richard Dawkins, and many other scientists and philosophers who have been, and remain, energetic opponents of religious dogmatism and superstition. It was a room full of highly intelligent, scientifically literate people—molecular biologists, anthropologists, physicists, and engineers—and yet, to my amazement, three days were insufficient to force agreement on the simple question of whether there is any conflict at all between religion and science. Imagine a meeting of mountaineers unable to agree about whether their sport ever entails walking uphill, and you will get a sense of how bizarre our deliberations began to seem. While at Salk, I witnessed scientists giving voice to some of the most dishonest religious apologies I have ever heard. It is one thing to be told that the pope is a peerless champion of reason and that his opposition to embryonic stem-cell research is both morally principled and completely uncontaminated by religious dogmatism; it is quite another to be told this by a Stanford physician who sits on the President’s Council on Bioethics. Over the course of the conference, I had the pleasure of hearing that Hitler, Stalin, and Mao were examples of secular reason run amok, that the Islamic doctrines of martyrdom and jihad are not the cause of Islamic terrorism, that people can never be argued out of their beliefs because we live in an irrational world, that science has made no important contributions to our ethical lives (and cannot), and that it is not the job of scientists to undermine ancient mythologies and, thereby, “take away people’s hope”—all from atheist scientists who, while insisting on their own skeptical hardheadedness, were equally adamant that there was something feckless and foolhardy, even indecent, about criticizing religious belief. There were several moments during our panel discussions that brought to mind the final scene of Invasion of the Body Snatchers: people who looked like scientists, had published as scientists, and would soon be returning to their labs, nevertheless gave voice to the alien hiss of religious obscurantism at the slightest prodding. I had previously imagined that the front lines in our culture wars were to be found at the entrance to a megachurch. I now realized that we have considerable work to do in a nearer trench.

The person swears, surprised. “Shit, you’re awake.” The voice is slurring, but I recognize it nonetheless. “What are you doing in here, King Jovan?” I ask. He is acting strangely. His movements are clumsy. He takes several steps backwards during his walk towards the bed. I watch, my fear turning into confusion. He finally makes it to the seat at the end of the bed and collapses. “Your room is huge,” he complains, huffing as though he has run uphill. “You just beat up your own guards,” I say. This is beyond strange. I don’t know what to think, or if I should get him help. He closes his eyes, a grin across his face. “Yep.” He sways on the seat while I hover next to the bed in the fur, uncertain.

Yet wrapped in this sort of adaptation for change is the mechanism for growth, and it, too, is rooted in what we might call stress. This is the process at work in every long run uphill or in every set of bench presses that reaches for a new personal record. We build muscles by tearing them down, stressing them beyond their limits. The body reads this as a need for more muscle to meet these new conditions of your life, and so the body builds it. And this works the same way in the brain: brain-building chemicals build new cells and make existing cells stronger. Yet Sterling’s

The Rosalie really did not want to go like the clappers and performed its usual consumptive drama every time we came to an uphill slope, coughing and gasping like a dying Dickens heroine, and finally just stopped—engine still gasping a bit but the car just stopped. Simply could not move forward up the hill. Choke full out but cylinders firing pathetically as though we were trying to make the poor thing run on nothing but air.

He slowly brought his hand out of his jacket. He was holding a long-barreled pistol. “Wait a minute!” Jack yelled. Woody looked down at the pistol. “I didn’t know what to expect when I saw that note. Figured I better not take any chances.” “I’m glad we got everything straightened out,” Jack said. I shifted around and got my feet under me. When Woody started to raise the pistol, I figured the time for talking was over. I took off running along the shoreline. Behind me the pistol went off. I veered away from the lake and dashed uphill toward the trees, leaping over rocks and half-buried driftwood. “Eddie!” Jack yelled. I kept running. “Eddie, you idiot!” I glanced back over my shoulder. Jack and Woody were still standing beside the lake. “Get back down here,” Jack yelled. “He was just signaling.” I came down a lot more slowly than I went up. “I wish I had a movie of that,” Jack said. “You took off like you were shot out of a cannon.” “Yeah, yeah.” I knew I’d be hearing about that one for a long time.

Aim not, if you are wise, to make water run uphill nor try pulling milk from the udders of a billy-goat.

Doesn’t matter if you run a barbershop, pharmacy, or gas station, remaining independent in today’s America is an uphill slog and the hill gets steeper with each passing year.

He arranged three hundred pairs of women’s shoes on the stairway that climbed from Taylor Street to Broadway. High heels and flats, running shoes and loafers, all of them heading uphill, as if an army of invisible women had paused to rest while climbing. Danny-boy

The Burden of Success — Truly is a Heavy Load Lonely is the Path — Down this Distant Road Decisions that are Bold — Sometimes activate Emotions that run Cold Endurance of Will — Fuels Stamina running Uphill Do not for a Second Hold — That which may help you Unfold Cosmic Benevolence in Mold — Of a Soul that cannot be Sold

Run Uphill Simple heuristic: If you’re evenly split on a difficult decision, take the path more painful in the short term.

Run Uphill Simple heuristic: If you’re evenly split on a difficult decision, take the path more painful in the short term. If you have two choices to make, and they’re relatively equal choices, take the path more difficult and more painful in the short term.

you slowly feel something flickering inside the brain, somewhere in the lower front. the chemical shift, like someone unauthorized has entered a power plant and turned on every switch on sight. it comes like thunder, wraps you inside your body, and screams inside your soul. it is heavier than anything you know of, yet see yourself easily fly. it’s like a thousand fireworks have all been lit at once. there is so much movement and it only gets faster, just like the forest fires of august moving uphill. you can feel the energy of a star each time you take a new breath. so you hastily light up your world, and of those around you, as rewarding and punishing it may get, and impatiently wait for the fuel to run out like it always did. and when it finally does, you realize that you cannot even get out of bed to take a shower or answer a phone call.

We did eight hundred push-ups every goddamned day, some days over two hundred chins, and they ran us. Christ, we ran ten miles every morning and another five at night, and sometimes even more than that. We weren’t big guys, like badass football linemen or any of that, you know, Rambo with all those pansy protein-shake muscles bulging. We were skinny kids, mostly, all stripped down and hungry, but, hell, we could carry hundred-pound packs, four hundred rounds, and a poodle-popper uphill at a run all goddamned day. You know what we were? We were wolves. Lean and mean, and you definitely did not want us on your ass. We were fuckin’ dangerous, man. That’s what they wanted. Recon. That’s what we wanted, too.” —excerpt from Young Men at War: A Case by Case Study of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, by Patricia Barber, Ph.D. M.F.C.C. Duke University Press, 1986

I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world,” E. B. White once wrote. “This makes it difficult to plan the day.” The Declaration of Independence promises Americans the unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. In the quest for happiness, many of us choose to enjoy the world as it is. Originals embrace the uphill battle, striving to make the world what it could be. By struggling to improve life and liberty, they may temporarily give up some pleasure, putting their own happiness on the back burner. In the long run, though, they have the chance to create a better world. And that—to borrow a turn of phrase from psychologist Brian Little—brings a different kind of satisfaction. Becoming original is not the easiest path in the pursuit of happiness, but it leaves us perfectly poised for the happiness of pursuit.

made to believe you are ill by a society with the will to sell you the pill designed to then instil a sense of free will to make you just be still prevent from making the kill pushing you the pill to satisfy with thrill to stop the craving shrill like a pneumatic drill but then you get the bill to pay for the refill you must avoid bastille addicted to the pill life starts again to spill crushed now is your will you need that pill you do not have the skill to keep running uphill you need that pill to make reality distil you can never leave you need that pill you can never leave you need that pill

his life a constant uphill battle. No matter how hard he worked or how much he followed the rules, nothing ever changed, his life a monotonous country two-step. Quick, quick, slow, slow, run, run, walk, walk, a tedious, repetitive dance that never ended in a glorious crescendo.

Injecting logic works best when: You catch the build-up of emotion, such as tilt or fear, before reaching your emotional threshold. If not, you have a major uphill battle to regain the ability to think clearly and play well without having to take a break or quit. Why? Once your emotions have crossed the threshold, it becomes harder and harder to think clearly. Injecting logic is really just thinking. Therefore, if your emotions have shut off your ability to think, trying to inject logic is the equivalent of trying to run on a sprained or broken ankle. Your logic also corrects the underlying flaw. The fastest way to resolve a mental game problem is by injecting logic that also corrects the underlying flaw that is causing it. Basically, you’re working toward two goals at once.

Yes, sergeant. Without a fight. This man can make water run uphill and he has a commander. I love the idea of giving in without a fight. I’ve fought for ten years and giving in without a fight is what I’ve always wanted to do.”   Water

A Choice I’m singing joyful praise to GOD. I’m turning cartwheels of joy to my Savior God. Counting on GOD’S Rule to prevail, I take heart and gain strength. I run like a deer. I feel like I’m king of the mountain! HABAKKUK 3:18–19 MSG Many days, life seems like an uphill battle, where we are fighting against the current, working hard to maintain our equilibrium. Exhausted from the battle, we often throw up our hands in disgust and want to quit. That’s when we should realize we have a choice. We can choose to surrender our burdens to the Lord! What would happen if we followed the advice of the psalmist and turned a cartwheel of joy in our hearts—regardless of the circumstances—then leaned and trusted in His rule to prevail? Think of the happiness and peace that could be ours with a total surrender to God’s care. It’s a decision to count on God’s rule to triumph. And we must realize His Word, His rule, never fails. Never. Then we must want to stand on that Word. Taking a giant step, armed with scriptures and praise and joy, we can surmount any obstacle put before us, running like a deer, climbing the tall mountains. With God at our side, it’s possible to be king of the mountain. Dear Lord, I need Your help. Gently guide me so I might learn to lean on You and become confident in Your care. Amen.

STRIVE TO TRUST ME in more and more areas of your life. Anything that tends to make you anxious is a growth opportunity. Instead of running away from these challenges, embrace them, eager to gain all the blessings I have hidden in the difficulties. If you believe that I am sovereign over every aspect of your life, it is possible to trust Me in all situations. Don’t waste energy regretting the way things are or thinking about what might have been. Start at the present moment—accepting things exactly as they are— and search for My way in the midst of those circumstances. Trust is like a staff you can lean on, as you journey uphill with Me. If you are trusting in Me consistently, the staff will bear as much of your weight as needed. Lean on, trust, and be confident in Me with all your heart and mind. But I am like an olive tree flourishing in the house of God; I trust in God’s unfailing love for ever and ever. PSALM 52 : 8 Lean on, trust in, and be confident in the Lord with all your heart and mind and do not rely on your own insight or

Please, please do not put “only” in front of the distance you run. You ran it. It is yours to enjoy, not apologetically mentioned in a hushed voice. I did ten miles Saturday that I was just tickled pink with because of the way I did the uphill stretch—hardest running I have done in several weeks. Do not put words into describing your running that are driven by someone else’s ego.

so when they are running from uphill, it makes a tremendous amount of noise. That is very bothersome, especially if they have big feet.

First they told me: “build a following and the industry will follow.” So I spent my entire 20s building a following on zero budget, getting by on donations. Then they told me: “You need a literary agent. But a literary agent wants to see you have a following and something big going on.” So I started my own small press and self published 5 books and spent day and night connecting with my people until I’d sold over 35,000 copies in 35 different countries and now they tell me: “no agent wants to work with a self published author.” Sometimes I feel like I was doomed from the very start, the very day I sat my food on that plane to London 12 years ago. Like the whole world keeps saying “you can fight all you want but we won’t let you in.” But I do have freedom and I do have my following and I have vulnerable souls writing to me on Friday nights, about loss and hope and how my books or music or words played a small part in something they went through and sometimes I think I would throw all that away just to have a literary agent and a management and the contracts and headlines… because I’m tired.. of always fighting uphill.. but then I get that message, on a Monday night, and I take my computer to a bar close to where I live in Berlin, high above the city, and I write like never before because I have my people and vulnerable souls to find and I have so many books in me and time is not endless, time is crucial, and lately I’ve felt it running out, some nights, so I’m writing another book that won’t be noticed by the agents but I have my people and that’s all I will care about from now on. My people and my freedom, with time running out. That’s what I will focus on.

Throwing even more fuel on this fire was Alibaba’s record-breaking 2014 debut on the New York Stock Exchange. A group of Taobao sellers rang the opening bell for Alibaba’s initial public offering on September 19, just nine days after Premier Li’s speech. When the dust settled on a furious round of trading, Alibaba had claimed the title of the largest IPO in history, and Jack Ma was crowned the richest man in China. But it was about more than just the money. Ma had become a national hero, but a very relatable one. Blessed with a goofy charisma, he seems like the boy next door. He didn’t attend an elite university and never learned how to code. He loves to tell crowds that when KFC set up shop in his hometown, he was the only one out of twenty-five applicants to be rejected for a job there. China’s other early internet giants often held Ph.D.s or had Silicon Valley experience in the United States. But Ma’s ascent to rock-star status gave a new meaning to “mass entrepreneurship”—in other words, this was something that anyone from the Chinese masses had a shot at. The government endorsement and Ma’s example of internet entrepreneurship were particularly effective at winning over some of the toughest customers: Chinese mothers. In the traditional Chinese mentality, entrepreneurship was still something for people who couldn’t land a real job. The “iron rice bowl” of lifetime employment in a government job remained the ultimate ambition for older generations who had lived through famines. In fact, when I had started Sinovation Ventures in 2009, many young people wanted to join the startups we funded but felt they couldn’t do so because of the steadfast opposition of their parents or spouses. To win these families over, I tried everything I could think of, including taking the parents out to nice dinners, writing them long letters by hand, and even running financial projections of how a startup could pay off. Eventually we were able to build strong teams at Sinovation, but every new recruit in those days was an uphill battle. By 2015, these people were beating down our door—in one case, literally breaking Sinovation’s front door—for the chance to work with us. That group included scrappy high school dropouts, brilliant graduates of top universities, former Facebook engineers, and more than a few people in questionable mental states. While I was out of town, the Sinovation headquarters received a visit from one would-be entrepreneur who refused to leave until I met with him. When the staff told him that I wouldn’t be returning any time soon, the man lay on the ground and stripped naked, pledging to lie right there until Kai-Fu Lee listened to his idea.

I finally snapped out of it when I realized we’d started walking uphill. I blinked and looked around. Fewer trees. More rocks. Ahead? Pitch black. I had to crane my neck way back to see stars dotting the night sky. "A mountain.” “Hmm?” Daniel said. I jumped, and realized he was right beside me. Probably had been for a while. He put his hand on my back to steady me and said, “What’d you say?” “I know why I couldn’t see lights from the treetop. There’s a mountain in the way.” “Damn.” Daniel lowered his voice. “Corey’s not going to be able to make it up that. Not tonight.” “I don’t think any of us could make it up that tonight. Except maybe the two-time island wrestling champ.” I struggled for a smile. “Don’t count on it. I’m running on fumes here.

TRAIL DESCRIPTION Begin Segment 8 on the west side of CO Hwy 91 (no parking) at mile 0.0 (9,820). Camping is prohibited the next 4 miles. The trail enters the forest southwest and follows a few switchbacks uphill as it skirts the golf course, crosses a bridge, and passes under a power line. The CT then heads northwest and traverses ski runs, goes under a ski lift, and passes nearest the Copper Mountain Resort at mile 1.6 (9,768). There are restaurants, sporting goods shops, and some grocery shopping at the base of the ski hill. The trail passes underneath the American Eagle Ski Lift and then becomes single-track at mile 2.1 (9,988), following a few roundabout switchbacks up the hill. There are two streams ahead, followed by great views of the Tenmile Range. At mile 3.4 (10,345), bear sharply to the right and leave the horse trail the CT was following. A cross-country ski trail merges from the left at mile 5.0 (10,519), but the CT continues straight ahead. At mile 5.2 (10,480), pass Jacque Creek, immediately followed by Guller Creek. There is a campsite just up the hill between the two. Continue upstream along Guller Creek following an elongated meadow to mile 6.2 (10,854) for additional camping and water. Janet’s Cabin, a popular ski hut, comes into view as the trail climbs out of the canyon.

So here I am striding along the meandering path that leads to our village. The earth, the grass and everything around is wet from a recent shower. I myself am drenched to the skin and keep slipping in the mud. The path goes steeply uphill. I hasten my steps, scale the hill almost at a run and suddenly my village opens to view, lying in the valley as in the palm of my hand. My knees give way and I sink on a boulder, a lump in my throat. I sit for a long time, swallowing tears and waiting... At last I see Granny go out of our house. She is more bent than she was last year, but she moves briskly enough. I jump up, grab my weightless suitcase and run downhill shouting at the top of my voice "Gra-a-anny!

Runs like a rotary phone thrown into a running clothes dryer. Throws like an effete Frenchman throwing a bookcase uphill. Swings a bat like his elbows are stapled to his knees and his underwear is pulled over his head. States at you while you aren't looking.

Run Uphill Simple heuristic: If you’re evenly split on a difficult decision, take the path more painful in the short term. If you have two choices to make, and they’re relatively equal choices, take the path more difficult and more painful in the short term. What’s actually going on is one of these paths requires short-term pain. And the other path leads to pain further out in the future. And what your brain is doing through conflict-avoidance is trying to push off the short-term pain. By definition, if the two are even and one has short-term pain, that path has long-term gain associated.

All sources of energy in our Universe run down. We can't help that. Everything is downhill in just one direction, and we can force a temporary uphill, backward, only by taking advantage of some greater downhill in the vicinity. If we want useful energy forever, we need a road that is downhill both ways. That is a paradox in our Universe; it stands to reason that whatever is downhill one way is uphill going back.

All sources of energy in our Universe run down. We can't help that. Everything is downhill in just one direction, and we can force a temporary uphill, backward, only by taking advantage of some greater downhill in the vicinity. If we want useful energy forever, we need a road that is downhill both ways. That is a paradox in our Universe; it stands to reason that whatever is downhill one way is uphill going back.