I got an opportunity to go on a trek to Salher Fort , it is located in Maharashtra and is the second highest peak at 1,567 meters , the temperature varies with time it is hot during noon and gets extremely cold up to 5 degree Celsius at night and mornings, we started the trek as a group and had to climb 7km in 5 hours on day one and than we had an over night camp at the top camp , next day we had to wake up at 6 am and than start packing our stuff, we even collected trash from the mountain peak and started trekking down to the bus location. My goal was to complete the trek in 5 hours on each day and to at least be one of the people from top three to have completed the task at earliest.
LO-1 Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth
As I mentioned before I had been trekking earlier but this was a completely different experience for me and it was quite difficult as the trek was difficult due to Rocky surface ,the temperature varies with time , it is extremely hot during noon and , because of the pandemic I had not been working out, so my stamina levels were low, which made it even harder for me to climb , this made me realise that i had low stamina levels and need to workout daily to maintain my stamina , I wouldn’t call it a strength but even though it was difficult it felt good to step out of the house and connect with nature , I was aware about the fact that no physical activity can be harmful for overall health, but I wasn’t aware that stamina can decrease so much so fast, after coming back from the trek I felt the need to start working out daily to maintain my health , I think this was a mindset changing experience for me because it made me realise that in order to live a good life style it is important to maintain health, this was a very insightful experience as I realised I had a few weaknesses that I needed to focus upon , in the beginning I was quite disappointed in myself, but I still kept going and this completely changed my mindset, now I work out thrice a week and challenge my daily. Yes , I mostly definitely would work on my weaknesses instead of ignoring them because ultimately it improved the quality of my life. I wasn’t able to achieve my goal of being in the top three people to finish the trek at the earliest because I had low stamina , I was amongst the very last group of people to complete the trek , I was quit disappointed but this only made me realise that I had to work on my health and yes over coming this weakness could help me complete the trek at the earliest and other more advanced running treks , etc.
LO-4 Show commitment to and perseverance in CAS experiences
As I mentioned above due to my low stamina levels , this trek was extremely difficult for me to complete, at a point I was so tired that I almost physically quit and wanted to go back to the bus stop , but I knew that I had to stay committed because internally I wanted to reach the top and I didn’t want to be left behind , I had to commit to the trek and had to commit to taking very short breaks even though I wanted longer stops , this was physically very challenging, but I stayed committed and completed the trek on time , though I was in the top three , it still felt good to do something hard , it made me realise that if I keep going and stay committed even during difficult times I can do any task , it also made me realise that I had fight the negative thoughts, and not quit when things get difficult because the outcomes are always fruitful. It used to be hard for me to commit to something because procrastination always got the better of me but nowadays it’s easy for me to commit and be dedicated to a task because I know that eventually it will benefit me.
I think commitment is important in order to complete a task , I used to struggle with procrastination, because i had never kept deadlines ,commitment can help , improve quality of life , mental illness such as anxiety can be caused due to extreme stress, and not completing a task or meeting a deadline can cause such stress and eventually mentally draining problems like anxiety, so to maintain our mental health and not disappointing others and to also be disciplined it is important to complete a task.
Learner profile attributes I achieved
Reflective – Because after coming back from the trip I realised my weaknesses of low stamina , which eventually lead me to decide to go to the gym everyday to maintain my physical health.
Knowledgeable – The place I went to is called the Salher Fort , it is an old place made by Marathas to escape from wars and life taking fitghts they used to climb the 7km mountain and make small caves to hide in , they even made a big lake that still it this date give fresh drinkable water, we even learned how to make fire , so over all this was a very knowledgeable experience for me.
Risk taker – This trek as I mentioned before had a very rocky surface and had loose sad that could have easily made me loose my balance, I could have gotten injured easily , and I did , I fell off at least thrice because of the loose sand , but luckily did not got any sever injuries.
Evidence –
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1-3nT-js8AgybFEKlwZBSJSe4meUyFIWa