How many times did I climb the mountain and how many times did I think about it? The slow and laboured ascent, mildly treacherous in parts, but only for an instant as effort became synonymous with achievement. I laboured, but not in vain as that one goal of reaching the top came to fruition.

I first climbed Mount Beerwah, one of the Glasshouse mountains as a year 10 student in 1985. We had a guide and were constrained by running belays, as we climbed the mountain in unison, as if we had anything else in common besides the school we attended. It was fun, and yet the memory presents itself as an edited adventure, not to negate the duty of care aspect to a group of post pubescent males, who considered risk to be a natural part of life. It was hard, but not as hard the slow and measured decent back into school life, the drudgery of exams and assignments, sometimes accompanied by study. 10 became 11 and 11 became 12, not to infer a definitive, demarcated process but rather a languid traversal to the freedom of graduation and the rest of our lives.

3 years later I found myself back at the mountain, gazing at its awesomeness, the tallest of the glass house mountains with stunning 360 degree views from the summit and a sweet serenity, far removed from what ever I was doing during the 5 day week to earn money to enjoy the 2 day weekend. Never seemed fair that equation and many would concur. Still it was what it was, it is what it is, and as it is it shall be. That's why weekends are golden and the working week bronze for the most part, except the silver tinges of Friday, unless you also work on Saturday or Sunday as many do.

And yet why should it be so and my rhetoric pessimistic, accepting a status quo as if it was predetermined long before April 23 1970 when I hit the ground crying,breathing on my own for the first time. Oh that first breath that underpins our growing independence, crucial to our survival and as those of the rebirthing persuasion propose the only time we breathed effectively and perfectly. Little wonder, our very life depended on it.

"Take a deep breath and count to three" a father once said to a distraught child. Timeless and invaluable words urging us still to slow down when life overwhelms, pressures screaming from ever which way. Life's problems, simple or complex can not often be solved by rushing headlong and thoughtlessly in to them, like the child trying to communicate something so relatively profound through the veil of emotion. And we don't need the mountain to induce the mountain top experience, we just need to be still and listen for the answers.

Often times as a therapist I have seen the wonderful insight clients possess and that the solutions to personal and occupational issues lie within them, only covered over by emotion. Talking without the fear of being judged or edited as being delusional is not only therapeutic but emancipating.

Arguments and misunderstood messages only occur because as reasonable and rationale as humans are, we still process things emotionally, almost instictively, particularly in matters of the heart. And yet without this emotional process life has no meaning, good and bad no longer exist. There is no true appreciation of the up if we don't know the down.

I locked my keys and phone in the car the other night and called the RACQ for assistance. And rather than, immediately hearing those pacifying words of "we will send some one straight away" the friendly but obtuse voice seemed very interested in my life story, which I reluctantly provided only to be transferred to a more appropriate section. Exasperated by the procedural protraction I finally, after 10 minutes received the welcome words "Someone will be there within the hour." "Thank you" I vaguely mouthed as the operator urged me to be safe.

No doubt the call staff were following RACQ process to the letter, while I was subject to my own process, profoundly emotional and as far from objectivity as the last Tim Tam. Admittedly my knight in 'yellow armour' arrived in 15 minutes to liberate my keys from the impenetrable fortress which sometimes doubled as my car. But as I drove away the after burn of emotion cursed my stupidity and loudly pronounced that such experiences reflected and confirmed cognitive decline.

And yet two days later, with the benefit of time and objective reflection I realise I am not in cognitive decline, I just need to remember to breath deeply and count to 3 !