What most people do when they get lost in the woods is they go DOWN HILL. They think downhill will lead to homes, roads, cities. But out in the woods, mostly it leads to canyons and dangerous rivers. I always say, "Gravity can be a bitch!". Gravity pulls you down hill. It's easier and less effort on your part. One time a friend of my son that was hunting with us (his first time ever) he got separated and he kept walking down hill. He even walked right past a very well marked hiking trail because he was panicking. We eventually found him by firing our guns to let him know where we were and were able to rescue him.
We were told by our instructors you must fight this desire to go down and instead walk UP HILL! By going up hill we do three things for ourselves. First going uphill burns off that energy our bodies generate from all the fear and panic we have. It slows us down. We have to stop periodically to catch our breath. This keeps us from making rash decisions. Second, it gets us to higher ground where we can get perspective of where we are at and where we can go to get help. Maybe we see a house, or a road in the distance. Maybe we see a familiar landmark. This gives us HOPE which is a powerful feeling when one gets lost. Hope that you have a direction and you are in control of your situation. Finally, it provides a way for others to FIND you. A search helicopter can easily spot you on the top of a treeless hill rather than down in a brush filled canyon.
This doesn't only apply to hunting and hiking but also to our world. We live in a world where we can easily get lost as a society. The world is a big scary place and we panic in our searching for solutions. It's always easier to go DOWN in society than it is to go UP.
Take for example: abortion. I agree that our world is not fair when it comes to women and childbirth. Men can walk away from a baby and women cannot. We must realize that when a woman gets pregnant their hormones are generated to bond the mother to the unborn child. Hormones are very emotionally powerful chemicals in our bodies (I learned this when I became extremely low Testosterone at a very early age of 40 and I felt like crap). So we have 2 bars set a different levels for men and women when it comes to babies. Men are not only less emotionally attached to children, they physically don't have to carry the baby for 9 months and can move on. Women, on the other hand, cannot simply leave the child. So hear we have the classic "lost in the woods" situation. How do we level the bars between the sexes? What do we do? We have 2 choices here.
First we could go down hill and lower the bar for women and allow them an easy way to leave the child and emotionally divorce themselves from the situation. Simple...right? But going down you lose something. You lose a part of you that you were given. To become more like MEN you must LOSE that which makes you a WOMAN. Your emotional strength and emotional connection to the world and to children. An abortion robs you of something God gave you to make you unique. Our world and society loses when we require women to act more like men. Our world needs both woman and men. It has also been found that women who have abortions are much more likely to suffer from chronic depression. The downhill path leads to more downhill paths.
The second choice is to RAISE the bar on men and hold them accountable for their actions. Especially in today's world of DNA testing we can 100% prove who is the father and make them financially supportive. But that is a harder path. It's UP HILL. It requires the courts to step in and to enforce the laws we already have in place. It requires society to stop giving men a pass on these pressing issues (here's an idea! Let's fine men $10,000 per child to pay for the mothers maternity doctor visits and delivery). Why should they get a free ride and force the women in our world to pay the price?
This uphill path also gives women opportunity to slow down and reassess their choices in life and make better choices. It can give them HOPE as well. Hope that they have done the right thing and given someone a chance at life (even if they put the child up for adoption) and they took a lemon and made lemonade. Pregnancy can also be away for others to know you need help. Like the lost hunter standing up on a hill waiting for a helicopter to fly over, pregnancy is often hard to hide and society often instinctively wants to step in an help where it can and give aid. But like the hunter that goes down into the steep canyon and cannot be "found", so also the woman who chooses abortion hides her pain in secret, never able to let others know she's lost and in need of help.
We must be like the lost person in the woods and fight the urge to take the easier route in our choices because those choices can leave us more lost than we started as a society.
