Daily Adventure and the Power of a Quest
By Gentry Patterson
It’s six in the evening and we are nowhere close to finished. I turn around to check on Sam and notice that the sun is so low in the sky it’s illuminating the air around him, transforming him into a bright silhouette.
I squint to see the expression on his face. He’s grinning.
“We’re not even close, are we?” he asks.
I laugh and shake my head. “No.”
With several miles left to trek, eighty percent of which is straight up the side of a mountain, what seemed like a grand idea that morning is rapidly becoming a serious mission. There’s no time to waste, and the brush is getting thicker and thicker at a speed similar to the descent of the sun at our backs. Several questions run through my mind. How are we not there yet? You can see the mountain from where we started. How much longer could this journey possibly take?
Soon enough we’ve pulled out our headlamps, navigating through impenetrable thickets of greenbriar and brambles by feel, periodically checking Google Maps on our cell phones to make sure we haven’t strayed off course. 3 kilometers. 2 kilometers. 500 meters. I slip on some rocks and nearly tumble off the ledge below me, but manage to grab a tree limb in the nick of time. I stop to catch my breath and hear the sound of music and laughter in the distance.
“Did you hear that? I think we’re close!” I yell out in the general direction I just climbed from.
From the bottom of the slope, Sam yells in reply. “Hell yeah!”
Minutes later, we walk into a clearing at the top of Keel Mountain, where several of our friends have already arrived and set up camp, fire roaring and beers clinking. We made it. Someone spots us, and after some cheering and pats on the backs, we sit down and crack open a couple beers of our own, happy with our sore muscles and our battle wounds. I lean back in my chair and raise my drink, making eye contact with Sam. “Cheers! To another adventure.”
Oftentimes when things aren’t going well, when I’m questioning the meaning of life and feeling cynical, I remember how I felt that day that Sam and I walked from my house in Huntsville, Alabama to Keel Mountain, just for the heck of it. When we set out that morning, we had only a vague idea of how we would get there. Walking was certainly not the most efficient method of travel (the rest of our friends happily drove themselves to our campsite).
Not interested in crossing creeks and highways, through backyards and brush, our friends skipped the struggle and beat us to the destination. They also skipped the adventure. Sam and I had an absolute blast that day, just as we have anytime we’ve set a goal and gone out and achieved it. That’s the power of a quest.
Almost by accident, through experiences like this one, I’ve stumbled across the extraordinary power of quests.
What is a quest, exactly? A quest is made up of two parts: a goal and the actions you have to take to get there. Quests are flexible, variable in scope and importance, and sometimes silly. Quests are an antidote to boredom, a vehicle for infusing life with novelty and excitement. Quests require action, risk taking, and are defined by uncertainty. They are a vital tool for creating meaning in your life.
For a rare few, life itself is defined by a great quest. Some artists, for example, pursue their greatest work. There are fighters who give everything to win the championship belt. Many activists spend decades pursuing a great change, hoping to craft a better and fairer world. We know these individuals by the quests that defined their lives and by the incredible things that they achieved along the way.
For the vast majority of us, however, it isn’t exactly clear what grand quest we were born to embark upon. Merely considering the question can be enough to spark an existential crisis. After all, if you don’t have a quest, why are you here?
If that question induced a twinge of anxiety in you, it’s okay. Quests are a vital and important part of the human experience, but luckily for us, they don’t have to be big or important to be meaningful. When Sam and I walked to Keel Mountain, every minute of our day was infused with meaning. We had a mission, and therefore we had purpose, even if only for a day. The stakes were low, the goal was silly, and the achievement was mildly impressive at best, but we chose our quest and we followed through to the end. I’m still enjoying the benefits of that memory.
We all need to feel like this sometimes. A human who can’t find some meaning in their daily life is no better off than one that can’t find water in the desert. It’s critical. Without meaning, you can’t survive. We have to do things that feel meaningful, and quests are a powerful tool for creating those experiences. In the words of the great playwright Tennessee Williams, “Make voyages! Attempt them. There’s nothing else.”
Don’t let yourself overthink it. Understand that your goal doesn’t have to be grand or important for you to experience the joys of the journey. Pick something, anything, and go do it. Make a list of every pub in your city and have a beer in all of them. Venture to the highest point in your province. Recreate the best meal you ever had in your own kitchen. As Ovid put it, the bold adventurer succeeds the best. Enjoy your quest!
Gentry Patterson is an American writer and cartographer living in Birmingham, Alabama. He loves to be outside and enjoys spending time with a good book.
