Sometimes, the trail gets hard. Real hard. Like ‘I have enough food for four days, I’mma sit right here until I run out of food and have to move again’ kinda hard.
Ok, ok I never holed up anywhere for four days!
But as simple as hiking is, putting one foot in front of the other, sometimes your feet just don’t want to do it!
You know those times – when you’ve just been walking uphill, for 8 hours, and there is no summit or plateau in sight.
Or when it’s been raining, for five days straight.
Or when you’re constantly moving forward, and somehow the same swarm of bugs have been dive bombing your eye balls for over an hour.
Come on, I know I’m not the only who’s been there!
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Here are some inspiring hiking quotes to help keep you going through those tough times, remind you of the greatness you’ve already achieved, and make you see the best is still coming up.
I venture to say that at the bottom of most fears, both mild and severe, will be found an overactive mind and an underactive body. Hence, I have advised many people in their quest for happiness to use their heads less and their arms and legs more… We generate fears while we sit – we overcome them by actions. Fear is nature’s warning signal to get busy.
– Dr. Henry Link
The trick is what one emphasizes.We either make ourselves miserable or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same….
– Carlos Castaneda
To those who have struggled with them, the mountains reveal beauties they will not disclose to those who make no effort. That is the reward the mountains give to effort. And it is because they have so much to give and give it so lavishly to those who will wrestle with them that men love the mountains and go back to them again and again…. The mountains reserve their choice gifts for those who stand upon their summits.
– Sir Francis Youngblood
Whether adversity be a stumbling block, discipline, or blessing depends altogether on the use made of it.
-Anonymous
Courage is all too often mistakenly seen as the absence of fear. If you descend by rope from a cliff and are not fearful to some degree, you are either crazy or unaware. Courage is seeing your fear, in a realistic perspective, defining it, considering alternatives, and choosing to function in spite of risks.
– Douglas H. Chadwick
To venture causes anxiety, but not to venture is to lose one’s self… and to venture in the highest is precisely to become conscious of one’s self.
– Soren Kierkegaard
The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is that one comes from a strong will and the other from a strong won’t.
– Henry Ward Beecher
Winning is realizing you already have won by being in the running. You may not finish ahead of many other runners, but you already have beaten the much bigger pack of people who choose to move on wheels instead of feet.Losing is not starting, but being content to tell about what might or what might have been…
– Joe Henderson
There is more to be learned on one day of discomfort, poverty and anxiety than in a lifetime of apparent happiness, security, riches and power.
– Anonymous
And one hiking quote that always makes me smile:
“I think,” said Christopher Robin, “that we ought to eat all our provisions now, so we won’t have so much to carry.”
– A. A. Milne
For more inspiring hiking posts check out:
- 14 Reasons To Hike The Appalachian Trail
- What I Wish I Knew Before Hiking The AT Alone
- Plan Your First Ever Backpacking Trip, Without Overthinking It
Let me know your favorite hiking quotes in the comments below!
Love this post!
Great post! Roadeavour!