Messner Quotes & Sayings

When Reinhold Messner returned from the first solo climb of Everest, he was severely dehydrated, and utterly exhausted; he fell down most of the last part of the descent, and collapsed on the Rongbuk glacier, and he was crawling over it on hands and knees when the woman who was his entire support team reached him; and he looked up at her out of a delirium, and said, Where are all my friends? — Kim Stanley Robinson

My market value increases with every outside critisism. Therefore, the frequently raised contention that I am the most highly critisized mountaineer does not disturb me in the slightest. — Reinhold Messner

Seen from above, landscapes are made up of mountains and watercourses. Just as a transparent model of the human body consists of a framework of bone and a network of arteries, the earth's crust is structured in mountain ridges, river, creeks, and gullies. — Reinhold Messner

... one of the most decisive factors enduring a borderline situation is the WILL TO SURVIVE.
-Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald

historic eruptions, — Kate Messner

Maybe Sophie was upset but not mad. Sometimes, Ava couldn't tell the difference. She just assumed that whenever anybody wasn't happy, it was her fault. — Kate Messner

True inspiration unfolds itself, not by force or it becomes fake. True intuition is also the ability to be observant. — Chris Messner

In my state of spiritual abstraction, I no longer belong to myself and to my eyesight. I am nothing more than a single narrow gasping lung, floating over the mists and summits. — Reinhold Messner

Mark my words, Messner: the world is waiting, it's licking its chops, to take your boy away.'" "And my — Philip Roth

If you have a high-way on Everest, you don't meet the mountain. If everything is prepared, and you have a guide who is responsible for your security, you cannot meet the mountain. Meeting mountains is only possible if you ... are out there in self-sufficiency. — Reinhold Messner

Not only during the ascent, but also during the descent my willpower is dulled. The longer I climb the less important the goal
seems to me, the more indifferent I become to myself. My attention
has diminished, my memory is weakened. My mental fatigue is now
greater than the bodily. It is so pleasant to sit doing nothing - and therefore so dangerous. Death through exhaustion is like death
through freezing - a pleasant one. — Reinhold Messner

[I]n spite of her work as a reference librarian, she discovered that life isn't about knowing all the answers. The best we can do is make peace with our questions, learn who we are, know our strengths, and do the best we can with the gifts we've been given while we're here. — Kate Messner

But you're an artist. you should know there's more to a story than the part happening right now. — Kate Messner

It's a gray morning. A roll-over-and-snuggle-deeper-in-the-covers morning. — Kate Messner

A gust of wind rattles the window, and I look out. Leaves are whooshing all over the place, flying past horizontally as if they have engines of their own. — Kate Messner

Inner harmony is the prerequisite for any climber who seeks to push the frontiers; without it he should give up extreme mountaineering.
-Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald

I didn't go up there to die. I went up there to live. — Reinhold Messner

I was in continual agony; I have never in my life been so tired as on the summit of Everest that day. I just sat and sat there, oblivious to everything ... — Reinhold Messner

Bolts are the murder of the impossible. — Reinhold Messner

I always take the same perspective with each new adventure. I put myself in the position of being at the end of my life looking back. Then I ask myself if what I am doing is important to me. — Reinhold Messner

I love early snow now, though. Especially snow that happens when you least expect it and just sprinkles down for a while. It feels like a secret. — Kate Messner

Any fool can know. The point is to understand. - Einstein — Kate Messner

What counts are merely the experiences one gains along the way.
-Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald

We have come a long way, we have a long way to go. In between we are somewhere.
(Attributed to Reinhold Messner?) — Kim Stanley Robinson

It is said that a man is rejuvenated every seven years- that all his cells are replaced. I wonder, does that also apply to his spirit?
- Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald

You have to let go before you can reach. — Kate Messner

Those that reach their goals perish. — Reinhold Messner

After every few steps, we huddle over our ice axes mouths agape, struggling for sufficient breath to keep our muscles going.... at a height of 8800 metres, we can no longer keep on our feet while we rest. We crumple to our knees, clutching our axes.... Every ten or fifteen steps we collapse into the snow to rest, then crawl on again. — Reinhold Messner

The wonderful things in life are the things you do, not the things you have. — Reinhold Messner

I want to solve a climbing problem in the mountains, not in the sporting goods store. — Reinhold Messner

Mountains are not fair or unfair, they are just dangerous. — Reinhold Messner

send me here, to the heart of the storm belt, for the summer. — Kate Messner

There is no single, correct objective in mountaineering; there are only possibilities. One of them leads beyond the impossible.
- Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald

... I only know that when physical and emotional reserves remain unchallenged, this feeds the spiritual cancer of a life unfulfilled.
-Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald

Without the possibility of death,
adventure is not possible. — Reinhold Messner

When I rest I feel utterly lifeless except that my throat burns when I draw breath ... I can scarcely go on. No despair, no happiness, no anxiety. I have not lost the mastery of my feelings, there are actually no more feelings. I consist only of will. After each few metres this too fizzles out in unending tiredness. Then I think nothing. I let myself fall, just lie there. For an indefinite time I remain completely irresolute. Then I make a few steps again. — Reinhold Messner