Hope

“But then came the swell – the physical proof that there really was something outside this limitless prison of ice. And all the defenses they had so carefully constructed to prevent hope from entering their minds collapsed.” **

Oceanic water is in a constant state of motion: surface winds and (rare) underground tremors cause it to undulate, rise, crest and eventually break. Some waves – swells – are different and originate from distant storms whose force reverberates very far away from the eye.

Although rudder damage (or ice pressure) brought Endurance’s 1915 polar exploration journey to an abrupt end, the journey of its crew was far from over. Many months of peril, courage, hunger, and uncertainty passed until rescue (and many more would pass until the wreckage would be found).

During those bitter cold months, Sir Ernest Shackleton and his men established a new goal – survival – and focused their daily routine on that instead of on crippling despair.

Can hope lift us up – like the swell did for the Endurance team – even after outer events break our inner rudder or crush our hull?

** Alfred Lansing, Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage [Part III, Chapter 3]