英语专业晨读美文-励志篇 10 Deciding to Live

[00:01.20]Deciding to Live

[00:04.27]I believe I am a climber. Three years ago,

[00:09.29]a series of medical and personal crises 1 took what was a clinical depression

[00:14.43]and made it something much darker.

[00:16.95]I thought of it as falling—as jumping off a bridge on a rainy winter day:

[00:21.54]three seconds in the air before I hit the water and plunged 2 deep into the icy cold,

[00:26.68] my heavy coat pulling me deeper. And the surface far overhead—too far away.

[00:32.70] This is the question that kept me from making the image a real one.

[00:36.42]What if I changed my mind? Jumping into the water,

[00:41.01]the air in my lungs would fail me before I could swim back to the living world.

[00:45.60] I would know for those last seconds that I did want to live after all,

[00:50.19] but it would be too late.

[00:52.17]I'm not sure why I started climbing.

[00:55.01] I walked through the door of the local climbing gym one day on a whim 3.

[00:58.95] It was an alien world: strong beautiful men and women,

[01:03.00]towering walls under sodium 4 vapor 5 lights, white dust filling the air.

[01:07.80]Light instead of dark. Up instead of down.

[01:11.85]It was in every way the opposite of what was inside me.

[01:15.90] The second time I climbed, I got to a move where I was sure I would fall.

[01:20.71] I was 25 feet up on a rope, but I didn't know yet that I could trust it.

[01:25.64]I heard my voice say out loud, "I have a choice here: fear or joy.

[01:31.21]" What I meant was, climb or don't climb, live or die.

[01:36.35]In the more than two years since then,

[01:38.97] I have climbed hundreds of days—inside and out,

[01:42.58]sometimes tied to a rope, often not. I do pay a price here.

[01:47.72] My body can be so bruised 6 from hitting walls

[01:50.89]that people ask me about my home situation.

[01:52.97]Nine months ago, I broke my leg and ankle.

[01:55.92]I healed 7 fast, but the risk remains 8. Next time I might not.

[02:01.07]Climbing requires a cold-blooded decision to live.

[02:04.57]If I am inattentive or careless, I will fall.

[02:08.28]Every time I climb at the gym, or rope up for a route outside,

[02:12.55]or go bouldering—which is climbing without a rope,

[02:15.61]and often more dangerous—I am taking a risk.

[02:19.33]And I am committing to staying alive.

[02:21.95]Now, I believe in climbing, in not jumping.

[02:25.78]Jumping would have been easy, just step over the bridge railing and let go.

[02:30.49] Climbing is harder, but worth it.

[02:33.77] I believe that deciding to live was the right decision.

[02:37.38] There's no way to describe the terrible darkness of depression in a way

[02:41.53]that non-depressed people can understand.

[02:43.94]Now, I'm less focused on the darkness.

[02:47.00] Instead, I think about the joy I feel in conquering 9 it and the tool I used.

[02:52.91] I am a climber, and I am alive.