You know how, at the start of a big endeavor, you worry that you’ll never drive it to completion? That you’re about to bite off more than you can chew and delude yourself in general? How embarrassing the very thought of failing to finish what you started feels? Particularly if there’s a public aspect to it?

Well…..during the New Year holiday, Walt and I hiked to Mt. Everest base camp, which sits 17,500 feet above sea level.

On the first day of this two-week epic excursion, we ran into The Girl in the Puffy Red Coat.

She was trudging up hill in a heavy down coat, one suitable for the summit of Everest at, what, 29,000 feet and -40°F. On her head was a matching adorable hat. You know the kind… thick knit with a puffy fur pom-pom.

By this point—I don’t know, a couple of hours in—both Walt and I were down to our shorts and t-shirts, slugging back water like desert rescue victims. Wishing we had an air conditioner and a portable electric fan.

Who knows what the ambient temperature was, because it really didn’t matter.

Most people think that the trick to mountain climbing is staying warm. With temperatures frequently well below zero, this makes perfect sense. Except, the real trick is to keep from overheating as you burn calories, which involves layering down, often to your shirt sleeves. Because, start sweating like a demon, and you’ll never get warm once you stop moving. That’s how you freeze to death.

As I passed TGINTPRC, I suggested she take off her coat to better perform, but she politely demurred.

“She’ll never make it,” I said to Walt, and of course, he agreed. (Both of us fancy ourselves good judges of this shit.)

And yet….day after day, there she’d be, trudging up yet another mountain pass in that ridiculous red coat and hat. TGINTPRC moved slowly, granted, but she was progressing, nonetheless.

Each time we saw TGINTPRC we marveled. How could a novice who makes such rudimentary mistakes manage to keep going? How had she not quit?! How had she not frozen to death at night in those drafty tea-houses?

Girl-in-Puffy-Red-Coat sightings became something of a game. Even our Sherpa and porter had fun taking part.

And sure enough, fourteen days in, there she was, at the Everest base camp. In that stupid red coat and hat, which was FINALLY the right layer to be wearing.

I thought of TGINTPRC when I was talking to a writing coach friend of mine. We were marveling at the people who had managed to write and publish a book, the ones we SWORE would never make it. The ones who were too busy, or too perfectionistic, or too scattered, or afraid, or too whatever… Yet they had defied the odds. They had made it.

We also bemoaned the star pupils, the ones who stank of drive and success, who didn’t complete the task for whatever reason. The ponies we would have placed our bets on at the track, only to have lost.

The thing is you can’t always tell which camp you’re going to fall in. Others can’t guess either. They’re equally as likely to get it wrong. Even the pros.

You may question your tenacity, your tendency to doubt, the typical shit that gets in the way of starting a venture, but you’d be amazed how often you’re wrong.

Look, if you’re going to do something that matters, like sink your soul into a book (not just any book, THE book), you’re going to question yourself; your temerity, and your resolve. If you’re smart, you’re going to think yourself incapable of doing the job for a whole host of reasons. You’ll focus on the obstacles that promise to take you out. And completely miss some you’re too naïve to expect, though you’ll intuit them.

But if The Girl in the Puffy Red Coat taught me anything, it’s that sometimes all you have to do is keep going, regardless of how bloody hot you feel, until you make it to basecamp. Until you prove  a bunch of faceless strangers wrong.