by Christopher "Janus" Donnelly
Hello, and welcome to Home Questing, the 21st task. Before our break, I asked you to submit the greatest feat of strength.
First, from Cressida is this, which I shall post with her own words : “I thought my feat of strength would be lifting and holding this huge full bag over my head, but it turns out the real strength comes in submitting this picture as I don't like myself or my body in this photo and it takes strength to do it anyways and to be genuinely me and try to be proud of myself anyways.”
Next up DelHemar is really using his head (and back for that matter):
Finally from Janus is a different interpretation of a feat of strength:
So, thinking about who I know that is fit and strong, I decided to go with The Chimeronian Warlord: Saka! Take it away Saka:
Thanks Janus!
The competitors for this task provided all of us with an excellent demonstration of the complexities that lie behind the deceptively simple word "strength". Physicality usually comes to mind first, and even within that arena we have all sorts of variety between endurance, pure exertion of force, and myriad ways of combining them. Then we have the complimentary domain of mental strength, which I consider to be considerably more important. Demonstrating compassion, overcoming fears, communicating honestly, pushing through pain, striving for growth, questioning one's own beliefs, developing healthy habits, and consistently loving oneself and others are all incredible feats of mental strength. (As is walking past snack food vendors on market days!)
With all that said, we have before us three submissions vying to be judged the greatest feat of strength:
Cressida appears to be lifting a large bag with a pillow or two inside, and that alone does not strike me as very impressive. As she notes, however, many of us are our own worst critics. In such cases it takes courage to do the work of acknowledging who we are, including our perceived flaws, and to nevertheless actively go out into the world with a smile on our faces. Cressida has done just that, and as such I'll award her first place and 5 points.
Janus's feat of strength also incorporated physical and mental components. For those of us who aren't Dagger of Blackwood or from even farther north than Creathorne, and thus to whom the measurement of "7.51km" is effectively meaningless, the distance he claims to have run is equivalent to 4 ⅔ miles. That's nothing to shake a stick at - running more than a couple of miles at a time takes either a strong will or something really dangerous right behind you. Your body has to be strong enough to keep moving just as much as your mind must be strong enough to tolerate, appreciate, or ignore the pain. Since Janus seems to have been running in a loop, and his submission says it's the longest he's run to date, I expect he didn't just have a zombie chasing after him. Unfortunately, I don't know much Seer magic and have no way to verify that Janus was actually running in circles. For all I know he was simply trotting on a horse for 40 minutes, so I cannot in good conscience award him any points. Better luck next time, Janus!
And thus it comes to pass that I award DelHemar and his all-too-familiar moving day feat of strength second place and 4 points. He may have beat out Janus even without the disqualification if I knew how long DelHemar held the mattress like that. Mattresses are unwieldy and wicked heavy, and his invitation of back injury to complete this task demonstrates stronger commitment to the competition than I would have brought to the table in his stead. DelHemar, I am very impressed, and will happily seek your assistance the next time I want to rearrange my furniture!
That's it for folks who get Home Questing points from me this week! We each possess a unique combination of proficiencies and challenges, and I have yet to know a person who was not admirably strong in one way or another. Thank you, Cressida, DelHemar, and Janus for showing us some of your strengths!
Thank you Saka! It’s a shame that you disqualified Janus, because I was pretty sure he cheated with time magic and I was going to disqualify him myself. Anyway, that leaves us with the two remaining people.
In first place I will give the points to Cressida, who took strength in a direction I did not anticipate. Sometimes the toughest challenges and toughest critics we face come from within, and the strength that it takes to overcome it is high, so Cressida earns five points.
In a close second though, for more traditionally completing the challenge is DelHemar. I have moved before, and it takes a lot of effort to manipulate mattresses of that size. It is an impressive feat of strength, and I hope everything breakable survived. For this, DelHemar gets 4 points.
So, after the point for participation, our scores for the week are: Cressida with 11 points and DelHemar with 9. Tune in next week for the next challenge!
P.S. from Saka:
If you have another minute to spare now that you've finished reading Janus' lovely View from Valehaven article, I'd like you to try something even if it might feel a bit silly. Sit down with pen and paper, or simply close your eyes and think: list three of your best strengths, one strength you'd like to develop further, and at least one strength you admire in someone you know. You might be surprised what you come up with, and I'd bet the person you think of would love to hear what you appreciate about their strength!