Quotes from Reinhold Messner

Through my failures I have learned how to live - and the more I failed, the more I learned. In my search for the limits, I have failed more than most, and it is this that has made me successful, over and over again.

I could claim that all my projects are altruistic, but I don't do that. All I'm saying is this: is it really a sacrilege to do the best you can, to express yourself, to do what I do?

Anyone wanting to reach the summit must lift his spirits to its heights

I define myself as a seminomad, so my world consist of transient places, where being at home is not possible.

I want to be liked for what I do, not for what I pretend to be. I try - maybe too forcefully at times - to have the courage of my convictions and to stand my ground when necessary.

Und so wie meine bloße Existenz mich einst weitergetragen und mir die Kraft gegeben hatte, extreme Bergtouren zu wagen, begann ich jetzt wieder zu träumen von einem Gesamtkunstwerk. Zuletzt wieder im Alleingang. Als wäre ich dazu bestimmt vorauszugehen, den Weg festzulegen, die Welt neu zu erfinden. So habe ich einst die Ziele in der Wildnis vorgegeben. Jetzt wurde eine kulturelle Aufgabe daraus.

Ein glückliches und ein sinnerfülltes Dasein sind deckungsgleich.

weiß ich, dass es so viele Lebenswege gibt wie Menschen auf dieser Erde. Den eigenen Weg zu finden ist die Kunst schlechthin, denn nur auf unserem Weg sind wir stark.

There's much more behind our thirst for monsters than curiosity or escapism. There is fear that the earth is loosing the last regions where myth can flourish.

I could tell that he had heard about me and that I would soon be a figure in the stories he would tell his grandchildren. A strange figure: The man who kept asking everyone about the yeti, and who himself looked like one. I did not want to know that tale, but I knew that it meant that the tale of the yeti - in some form - would exist forever. Storytellers die; their stories live on.

For me, success is not measured at the end of life. A successful life is what you have when you are doing things. There are moments when I overcome difficulties, and that's when I feel strong and fulfilled. My success, my life, was nothing more than turning ideas into reality.

Denn Erkenntnis – auch über uns selbst – lässt sich nicht im Gänsemarsch gewinnen. Und eine Gesellschaft, die das Suchen oder Forschen nicht zulässt, ist dem Untergang geweiht.

When I was leaving the auditorium at the end of one of my lectures, someone shouted out, You've been lucky! That's right, I thought, I've had more luck than any man deserves.

My feeling of satisfaction, my happiness if you like, is not dependent on applause or accolades of any kind but on the fact that I was able to do what I wanted to do - and to see it through.

My mountain as a symbol for Communist ideals? Nonsense. Yet that seems to be what it is all coming to. I do not consider my death tragic. Tragedy is the death of the soul, not the body. The Chinese had their ladder. I had my spirit.

Perhaps the true purpose of life is simply to express ourselves as best we can. Maybe my ability to keep finding new challenges appropriate to my age is part of the happiness, the thing that keeps me young, creative, and full of life. The setbacks and the opposition I've encountered are all part of my happiness. I have grown as a result and am still able to lead a self-determined life.

I don't think psychoanalysis is nonsense necessarily; I just don't see the point of it. An analyst can find out where the problem lie, but a witch from the jungle can do that as well. If I'm not allowed to live my own life, no psychologist is ever going to be able to help me. The real problem is that most people don't live their lives, they just get by somehow.

Friendship requires trust, empathy, and acceptance. I don't want to feel that I have to wear a disguise in front of my friends; otherwise, the friendship is worth nothing. Friendship means being accepted by a person for the way you are, and vice versa.

Ich war nie ein Wilder: zwar unangepasst, ein Sucher im Sinne von Geisteshaltung, Ideal, Ästhetik und Neugier. Und ich gehe weiterhin in die Wildnis: um einer gezähmten Welt zu entkommen, der wahren Menschennatur auf der Spur.

I am a fool who with his longing for love and tenderness runs up cold mountains.

I have the feeling that behind a certain dimension we cannot anymore see, understand, feel, smell, hear - nothing. What people are calling God I am not defining, but I am a 'possibilitiest.'

By climbing mountains we were not learning how big we were. We were finding out how breakable, how weak and how full of fear we are.

To me, it's just not that important whether someone climbs the Eigerwand in ten hours or in three.

Albert Frederick Mummery and Chris Bonington are the British climbers I most admire.