I love this article. I haven't hiked that far, but I've hiked very long and high single days, and have taken quite a few falls that have seemingly caused long-t

I love this article. I haven't hiked that far, but I've hiked very long and high single days, and have taken quite a few falls that have seemingly caused long-term foot damage where every time I set my foot down for the first time in a day, it feels like my arch collapses. I think it's an incredible mental challenge one must go through to do something like the author talks about, but I do wonder if it's not distinguishable from applying the same mental game to something like doing boring intellectual tasks. Such as a boring programming job for a company you hate. In both cases, it never occurs to me to quit, and the same force drives me to keep trying until it gets better or it ends. But pushing yourself with your brain to do the mechanical process of taking steps seems much more within reach than using your brain to make your brain do something it's not going to do. For me, once a task is knowable, predictable, or just very routine, my brain seems to cloud over with a haze, and my ability to see through it is like shining highbeams at fog in the middle of the night. With hiking, taking a step forward is always progress, but with software engineering, the next step is a mental hurdle that might just not happen, no matter how much you've learnt to suffer.