On Orienteering (or Getting Lost in a State Park)

Last weekend, on the invite of a friend, I tried orienteering for the first time. If you haven't heard of it (I hadn't), orienteering is a sport of navigation in which you have to find checkpoints distributed across an expansive natural landscape, using detailed topographic maps and a compass. In this case, we were at a state park outside Denver navigating around both man-made objects like RVs and dumpsters along with natural features like trees and streams.

As we prepare to be on the road for several months, largely in national parks and other wilderness, I thought it would be quite helpful to sharpen my navigation skills. I imagined we'd go out in the middle of nowhere, turn around 50 times, and have to find our way back. Turns out, it wasn't like that at all. Still, I took some valuable lessons after a day of practice.

Get your bearing right to start

Since orienteering is often a race, it can be tempting to look quickly at the map and then dash forward with a moderate sense of direction. I found it was often helpful to slow down at the start to get a clearer idea of where I was headed before starting.

In life, the clearer we are about where we're headed before we start, the more likely we'll get there without getting turned around.

Track your location often

At the same time, we sometimes have to begin taking steps in the general direction of where we want to go because we can't quite see the final destination. When that happens, I learned it's important to check the map early so I can reorient and check my progress.

I can often go long stretches assuming I'm on the right path when I'm slightly off course. Of course, doing that just leads me further off course. Again, what feels like slowing down in the moment actually makes things much easier.

In life, when we're first moving towards a new goal, we might not know exactly what the final destination looks like. Starting off directionally correct is necessary and it's helpful to continue to check in regularly to make sure we truly want to go where we're headed.

Keep going

There were several moments in which I thought about giving up and quitting — when I felt like I was walking in circles and had no idea where the next checkpoint was. I kept making up a story about my friend getting impatient because I was too slow. Whenever that happened, I took a breath and asked myself the worst thing that would happen if that were true. That helped me realize that even the worst case was not a big deal and allowed me to settle back, check the map and my surroundings, then keep going. (And he was not at all impatient as I took my time to finish.)

In life, I'm often tempted to quit when I can't yet see the finish line. And usually, the thing driving me to stop is an unwarranted fear. We never get to learn the lesson that will get us to the finish if we keep stopping in the middle. Keep going.

Keep things at an accurate scale

The two places on the map that mixed me up most were water features. I saw little blue blobs and immediately increased their size in my brain, even though on the map they were in scale with everything else. The result was that I ran past a couple of markers and got myself all turned around. Once I realized my mistake, the map made much more sense.

In life, we might make the obstacles along our path much bigger than they are in reality. For example, we might make asking someone on a date an impossibly large task when, in fact, it's as simple as asking a single question. My story about my friend becoming impatient was also me exaggerating the size of things. More often than not, our obstacles are nothing more than bumps in the road.

Orienteering is everywhere, all the time

I learned this as soon as my friend and I started driving and he asked about my experience with orienteering and navigating. It turns out, I do it in everyday life without thinking. The mountains are always on the west of me in Denver. Cities are built in grids. The analogy running through my book is GPS navigation. The core principles of setting a destination, locating ourselves, and then charting a course underpin my life. It was simply a matter of applying them to a new game.

In life, we're constantly measuring where we are compared against where we want to be. Most of that process, however, can remain unconscious unless we intentionally bring attention to it. The more we check in to ask where we actually want to go, the better we get at it. The more we slow down to discover where we actually are, the better we spot ourselves. Winning is about being able to do either or both at any moment we choose.

Go get lost and find yourself again. It just might be fun.

Love.
Matt