Teh Chad

I had the privilege of teaching a truly amazing hobby for about 8 years. Rock climbing!

People have this “fear” of falling. Hah! Justified or not, it can keep them from enjoying this sport.

Now, I love climbing and I don’t see that changing. However, what I love more is watching someone face that fear. The harder the fight, the more rewarding it is to see it. This is also why I enjoyed teaching teenagers more than adults. Adults are programmed to hide their emotions. Kids wear their heart on their sleeve.

Say we have an adult and a kid. Both are working with their best friends of roughly the same age and size. Both face the same fear, but each faces it in a different way.

The adult will hear what you tell them. “Keep your hips into the wall.” “Use your feet.” And then… “Trust the rope and your belayer.” They will use their head and force themselves to do what you tell them to do.

Kids on the other hand…! Kids are not afraid to show you that they are unhappy. After gripping the rock or wall holds, their arms and legs build up with lactic acid. Their appendages then proceed to shake and eventually fail. They freak out and cry and holler and scream even though they aren’t moving! (And their belay partner, usually their best friend, has the rope.)

The thing is, they all must overcome this fear. Let’s make this a little more personal for a second. Step back.

Think of your friends. Who do you trust? I mean really. Who do you REALLY trust? If you’re anything like me, that list is not very long if it’s even a list at all. In who’s hands would you entrust your life?

Once past that, who in their right mind would answer yes to hang off of a wall with you and trust you with their life?

Going back to our teaching situation to finish… Adults often hide their emotion while kids will make you their hero in a second!

One of my favorite times in the class is when the first few climbers are coming down. They have faced their fear! When they touch down, their face is a MILE WIDE! It is fantastic.

So get out and do it! You’ll feel amazing when you get over your fear!

I’ve done a lot of cool things in my short life.  One thing that I always enjoy is a trip up Long’s peak.  A few of the things I do are what some people would consider more “dangerous” than normal activities.  This is not really one of them.  What I share with this man is a love of beauty.

I stood where he did three weeks prior:

http://www.9news.com/news/local/article.aspx?storyid=123109&catid=346, http://www.estesparknews.com/?p=3572

Rereading my last post, I felt like I lost the purpose of the post. There were two points I wanted to make.
Take risks! Take risks safely.
Most people are afraid to take risks. Taking small risks teaches you how to deal with it. We all will take many risks in our lives. We will drive cars. We will go swimming. We will make financial commitments when we have jobs that may not last. We will open up to people about who we are. We may even do something fun like go to a Denver Donkeys game. Yet even football games have risks (I seem to remember a CU football game a couple years ago). Taking risks is part of our being. People need to do it.
The part that I don’t believe came across real well was my second point. Take risks, but take them as safely and simply as you can. When I did Long’s for the first time, I trained my butt off for a good couple of months. There was no doubt in my mind that I could physically do it. I took the real risk out as much as possible. People knew where I was. I had more than enough protection from weather. I had too much water. I had plenty of food. I would have to get hailed on before I’d have a bad day and I had done my homework on that too! As many variables as there are in a task like that (or anything for that matter), I wanted as many of them on my side as I could get.
Small business owners must take huge risks to keep their business running. Their employees depend on them to make the correct decisions. These things are not easy. However, these are the people that become great. These are the Mark Shuttleworths and Richard Bransons.
Go take risks! However, take the danger out of them where you can. You’ll be amazed what you are capable of!