Happiness, rather an enduring state of happiness, is not what you might think it is. We can't expect to win or feel good all the time. However, most people inadvertently attach their personal happiness to whether they're winning or losing, or feeling good or stuck in the suck.

So, on the weekend my girlfriend and I decided it would be a good idea to climb to the top of the mountain behind our house called, Spion Kop. It’s more of a hike than a “climb,” but for someone with an incomplete spinal cord injury, it was a grind—a test of determined endurance. The kicker was, I didn’t fully know what we were getting ourselves into when we left the house that day.