Climbing as a Metaphor

I'm going to schedule some outdoor top rope climbing for a just for me vacation in June. I've done climbing in a gym, done belaying, and climbed outdoors twice, but it was three years ago. Now I'm back to it.

Top rope climbing can be a metaphor for facing one's fears, trusting others and pushing past what you think you can accomplish. There are climbers out there who are blind, who started in their late 50's, and anything is possible if you set your mind to it.

I don't remember exactly what got me to start climbing in the first place. I think it was my sister, and a work related crisis - I said if I could get us through that rough place, I could do anything, and I'd take up climbing. And so I did.

When you're being belayed, that belayer's got to know what they're doing, and you've got to trust them, and trust yourself. It's a pretty scary process the first time, and you gradually come to trust yourself and your belayer and learn to climb.

Metaphorically speaking, I've climbed and suddenly done one of those "I think I'm going to die!" sudden falls. All the trust got knocked out of me in a nano second, and everything I thought I loved about the metaphoric climb, belaying and trust was swept away in the terror, which wasn't metaphoric, but very real. I think what kept me alive was that I grabbed onto a metaphoric rock and down-climbed to solid ground. In the form of self-care, therapy, a great boss, wonderful friends and traditional family. I am lucky, because if I didn't have all of that, I'm sure I would have crashed.

So now, standing firmly on the ground with both feet, I look up and think, there's no way I could climb again, maybe I'll never climb again, because I'm using climbing as a metaphor for trust in relationships. Suddenly, I'm shaky and skittish, just wanting to walk away from the wall of life. I try to convince myself it's still climbing if I just boulder, but that's not entirely true. Bouldering requires I trust myself mainly, because the fall is short and there's no one belaying you. It's a cop out for what I face, and I won't do it. So top rope climbing it is.

I'm going to learn how to trust again, and trust someone with me physically, to keep me safe. I'll hire an AMGA instructor to get me out on real rock, and ask him to challenge me in the routes. I'll ask him to be okay with it if I pause, cry, whatever, because I need to do this. I love real rock, and I love a good climb, and those are metaphors for life and its process.

I'm putting some major expectations on me on this one, and I know it. Trusting my body again to remember how to climb, trusting a belayer to keep me from a sudden fall. Trusting for him to communicate with me if a risk I'm going to take might result in a swingout, so be prepared. Perfect love, perfect trust, perfect communication is needed, and I'll need to go into the climb being okay to do this, and okay to miss a hand or foot hold and dangle up there for awhile.

In the meantime,I've got to get in climbing shape. I'm at my climbing weight now, but my endurance sucks, I get dizzy from the sudden weight loss that occurred with my metaphoric drop. So I've got to come to a better place with myself physically in order to prepare to succeed in the climb. So, I'm eating healthier foods, trying to eat more consistently, and planning on going on hikes and do some resistance training.

Years ago, I did Shotokan Karate, and it was a great thing in helping me get past my "shouldn'ts, can'ts" all of the baggage that came with me about how I perceived myself. I got a lot of body confidence doing it, until I injured a nerve in my back and couldn't go back to it. That actual injury came because of a bad instructor who filled in once for my good instructor. In life in relationships, and with dangerous sports, you've really got to have a good instructor that you can place absolute trust in.

So, that's what I'm going for, a corrective physical experience that will allow me to move the shakes and terror out of my body and get back to what I know. If you concentrate on the bad experience, you'll never climb again and you'll feel safe, but you won't know the process of real rock or real life, and will be sitting at the base just calling up beta to people who do climb. I hate unsolicited beta when I'm climbing, because it distracts me from what it is I am doing. I need to trust myself, know my own body, when I climb. Know and explore what I'm capable of.

It's kind of funny, how I first got into climbing after a workplace crisis that built my confidence enough to want to try it, and now, all these years later, I'm looking to a climb to help me build my confidence physically and relationally. Coming full circle, it seems.

I was mentally inventorying my climbing gear, and realized I need to destroy all of it, because it's too old (they have a short life) - at first, I was irked, but then, my life experiences as of late have made me feel stripped of all equipment I'd previously relied upon anyway. They'll have gear, and all I need are my rock shoes and a chalk bag. It's somewhat funny for me, gear girl extraordinaire, to be thinking of destroying the old, which I loved, and walking freely and lightly with just shoes and a bag. Maybe that's a metaphor, too. I don't haveto hang onto things that no longer serve a purpose, and I can trust I'll get what I need when I'm there.

In the meantime, I've got a little under 4 months to get myself together to do this right. Eat healthier, exercise, gear up my body with the muscles it will need in order to do this right. I don't want to forget I can trust myself, too!