I thought that I had made progress in my mission to reach the top. I thought I was closer. I thought that I felt the sun a little bit hotter in areas. Yet, I noticed something today that at first bewildered my mind, baffled my soul, and mystified my mission to reach the top.

 

    It was another ordinary day in my journey, which should have been my first warning sign. I was minding my own business, keeping out of other peoples way on the path, not tarrying too long on the side of the stream with those who had decided to stop, and I had even become comfortable in the hard walk up the hill. Needless to say, the becoming comfortable should have been the other warning sign.

 

    You see, I was making my way up the hill today and I noticed that I felt like I had been here before. Like one of those de’ja`vu’s. They were little things. It was nothing that you could point out right away. I noticed this oak tree that was on the side of a cliff. I remembered, as I passed, that in the beginning of my journey I had stopped to rest under the shade of this very tree. It seems so odd since it was just months ago that I had sat in the cool of the day under these very branches and now I pass once again on the very spot.

 

    This couldn’t be right. I continued my walk again and the farther I got the more I realized that the terrain seemed to be the same. Small rocks that I had stumbled on once before I stumbled on again not realizing they were once more in front of me.

 

    I even saw the backpack strewn on the side of the small path that months earlier I had so eagerly and painfully set down. I carefully knelt beside it and went through the contents as though they were something of priceless sentimental value that I had lost years before. I picked up a small item that had once meant so much, but was so very heavy in my backpack and impossible to carry on my journey.

 

    For a few moments I was caught up in the things I had left behind on my journey in search of it all. After debating what I could and could not take, I came to the conclusion once more that I could take it all back, but in doing so I would have to cease my journey. Knowing that discontinuing my journey to reach the inside of the mountain was impossible I laid it all down again and quickly walked away – not even looking back.

 

    I was still dumbfounded and perplexed as to why I even came across my belongings when I had passed them on the side of the road miles back. I thought long and hard as to this question and my conclusion was a painful one.

 

    I realized that my journey had become common and ordinary to me. I had become comfortable on my way to the top. As I backtracked trying to find where I had gone wrong, I quickly realized that I had been going in circles for quite a few days. My desire to stay comfortable had helped me make decisions on which way in the path I would go. I found that I often chose the path that seemed not easy, but common. I wanted familiarity in my journey and I promptly realized that familiarity is what I found.

 

    For in my journey to reach the inside of the mountain, I had lost my hope that things would ever change. I had put so much into the journey itself that I had lost my purpose for the journey. Even though I did not did not turn back or settle with the dwellers who stopped moving, somehow in my heart I had stopped. I became just another traveler on the road less traveled. The passion that once drove me to impossible lengths became a everyday feeling. I had failed to maintain my purpose as a journeyman.

 

    I knelt off the road on the side of a barely used rock, near a stream, far from dwellers, out of the distance of onlookers, away from the dusty road and once again found my purpose. In my kneeling, the words God flowed freely. I heard all that I needed to hear. I felt all that I needed to feel. I once again knew that there was more that I needed to obtain, but could not grasp hold of on this ordinary and common path. My need was to be met only on my journey to the inside of the mountain where things were most likely to become uncomfortable and unfamiliar.

 

    As I rose to find my way back to the path I saw what I had not turned my attention to for many months. I saw the view. I the sun as it rose in the midst of all that had gone on. I saw the clouds as they moved in with shade for today’s journey. Although there is more to be found on the inside, I can never again lose the ability to see what I can see from the outside. I can never become just another traveler on the road less traveled.