Scottish Mountaineering

Yesterday, I came across a familiar passage from a sixty-year-old book.  The 1951 book, The Scottish Himalayan Expedition, was written by W.H. Murray.  I have seen the passage before, although I'm not quite sure when.  I was happy to read it again.  Murray was writing about mountaineering, but I think he found a truth with far broader reach:

... but when I said that nothing had been done I erred in one important matter. We had definitely committed ourselves and were halfway out of our ruts. We had put down our passage money— booked a sailing to Bombay. This may sound too simple, but is great in consequence. Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way.

Maybe such insight is available only after the fact.  I don't think it's necessarily so.  After all, Murray's autobiography was entitled The Evidence of Things Not Seen--which is how St. Paul defined that quality that allows you to leap from Point A.