Subtitle: April Museletter series 1/5
There is a specific, silent zone on every mountain… and in every meaningful career or life transition… where the scenery simply stops changing.
The initial exhilaration of the trailhead has faded, and the “Before and After” transformation pictures feel like a distant, flickering light. You are no longer the person who started the climb, but you are not yet the person who conquers the peak… You’re simply in it.
The path stretches forward: steady, quiet, and often deeply uncertain.
Many of us know these stretches well and “lovingly” call them The Middle Miles. If we are not careful, however, we can mistake them for stagnation or, worse still, a sign of failure. We look at the lack of vertical gain and assume we’ve lost our way.
But here’s the truth I learned when looking back from a higher altitude (and from those moments when I failed to reach the peak I had chosen): The middle is not a detour. It is, in fact, where the majority of the work (and often the hardest work) is done.
The Strategic Fallacy of “Hustle Culture”
The Middle Miles are where many a worthy vision is quietly abandoned. This abandonment usually illustrates a primary strategic error: “The Big Rush.”
We live in a culture that rewards the “bold start” and the “triumphant finish.” Our LinkedIn feeds are an endless scroll of “Day 1” announcements and “We did it” celebrations. We applaud the breakthrough, the pivot, and the trophy.
But far fewer people post a photo of Wednesday at 2:00 PM in the second month of a six-month project—when the spreadsheets are messy, the inbox is overflowing, and the initial passion has been replaced by a dull ache in the shins.
This is where the “Head”, our logical center, often begins to play tricks on us. When we can no longer see the base camp we left behind, and the summit is still obscured by clouds, our brains struggle to measure progress. In the absence of a visible milestone, the ego assumes we are standing still.
Typical leadership advice might tell you to “grind harder” or to “tap into your ‘why’.” At Mountain Peak Strategies, we suggest a more clinical, strategic shift: The transition from Excitement to Determination.
- Excitement is the spark; it’s a powerful fuel that burns hot but fast. It’s essential for breaking you out of the status quo and getting you to the base of the mountain.
- Determination, on the other hand, is the steady, compressed oxygen that keeps you moving when the adrenaline has run dry. Determination supports you when the “going just keeps on going.” It ensures you stay the course because you trust the map you drew when you were feeling your most expansive.
The Shira Plateau: The Logic of the Flatland
In my upcoming book, Rise. Discover. Emerge., I write about a specific geographical feature on Mount Kilimanjaro: The Shira Plateau.
After days of grueling, vertical climbing through the rainforest and moorlands, you emerge onto an eight-mile stretch of relatively flat land. To the untrained eye, the plateau feels like a stall. You aren’t gaining altitude, and you aren’t “getting closer” to the peak in a vertical sense.
However, the Shira Plateau is a literal necessity. You must cross it to reach the next part of the climb. But more importantly, it is a biological necessity… the place where your body acclimates to the thinning air… and if you were to continue climbing vertically without this “flat” period, your lungs would eventually fail before you reached the summit.
If you feel like you are on a plateau right now in your business or your personal growth, your Head might be telling you that you’ve stalled. But, I want you to remember this: The plateau is not always where progress stops; it is also a place where integration happens and where your “mountain legs” are formed.
You are not stuck; you are doing the essential work of preparing for a higher altitude.
A Diagnostic for the Middle Miles
To navigate this period successfully, I want to give you a simple Diagnostic Audit activity. These four questions use your strategic center to map your current state, helping you distinguish between exhaustion and progress.
As you look at your “climb” this April, ask yourself these four questions:
1. Am I “Stuck Fast” or in a “Strategic Pause”? Is your lack of movement caused by a lack of resources, like tools, people, or knowledge (Stuck Fast)? Or is it a necessary period of acclimation (Strategic Pause)? If it’s the latter, stop fighting the stillness, lean in and get from it what you must. Use it to breathe. If it is the former, you need to figure out exactly where to put your energy and attention.
2. What is the weight of my “Pack”? As the climb gets higher, the air gets thinner. You cannot carry the same baggage at 15,000 feet that you carried at the trailhead. What habits, meetings, or old “scripts” are you still carrying that are now costing you too much energy? What can be left behind to lighten the load?
3. Am I practicing the “Three-Foot Rule”? Logic dictates that you do not need to see the summit to move forward; you only need to see the next three feet of trail. Are you wasting mental energy trying to solve problems that are still two miles up the mountain? Is focusing on your next immediate step all you need to do, right now?
4. Is my strategy coherent? In the MPS framework, the Head is where we agree to the process. Have you deviated from the process you set out at the beginning of the year? If so, is it a necessary, logical pivot, or a distraction born of fatigue?
Mapping the Path Forward
This month, we are going to navigate these middle miles together. We aren’t going to just “survive” them; we are going to use them to shape who you are becoming.
Leadership is rarely tidy. It is often a series of messy, quiet, devoted and determined steps taken through the fog. But when you align your inner terrain—your focus and your logic—with the outer demands of your climb, you move from striving to embodying.
If you’ve heard of the 12-Week Year goal-execution strategy, you know that looking at a year as one long, 365-day trek can lead to a very loooong “middle-of-the-year slump.” The goal is to create a series of micro-ascents to ease the transition and spend as little time as possible in the Middle Miles. By breaking your ascent into 12-week cycles, you create more “summits.”
We are going to take it one step further.
Your MountainWork for Week 1:
Find a quiet space and physically draw your “Map” for April.
- Mark your Base Camp: Where are you standing right now?
- Mark your April Ridge: Where do you want to be by April 30th?
Ignore the ultimate summit for a moment. Just focus on the terrain of the next 30 days. April is the Trailhead of Q2. Use your logic to narrow your field of vision. This prevents the “overwhelm” that leads to oxygen depletion in the middle.
The mountain is never just the mountain. It’s a mirror.
As you look at the path ahead this week, remember: You are not “stuck” in the middle… one way or another, you’re being forged by it.
I’ll see you at the next ridge.
Be Still. Be Focused. Be Free.
