Musings on the climbing life
It’s 3pm and I’m sitting in my desk chair, logging more and more hours at this fixed point in space. I’m willing myself to stay focused on the screen, where emails, Slack notifications, and browser tabs provide a constant onslaught of changing information. My eyes dart from left to right as my body stays firmly parked, right here, in my desk chair. If I turn my head, I can see out the window that it’s a beautiful day outside. I know days like these can be spent in conversation with the weather, connecting my body to the sunshine and pleasant 60 degree temps. But today, the weather is irrelevant to the task at hand. It doesn’t matter. I give up the search for feeling and instead turn off all feelings, as I grind through intangible tasks that will never leave this two-dimensional screen.
We all seek our own outlets to counter the screen-filled lives we’ve found ourselves living. Some people turn to yoga, or running, or making art, or meditation. I’ve tried them all, and while each has its own benefit, none of them really quite stuck. I always find myself aware of how much of a yoga class is left, as if I get some sort of medal once I’ve completed a class. Running is nice but inevitably I lose motivation to lace up my shoes and keep doing it.
Climbing is the most ‘real’ experience I’ve ever known. It’s where staying present comes naturally. Distractions fade away, and I’m left with breath, movement, and rock. My brain has always felt too chaotic to find full focus in anything other than rock climbing. It’s the only thing that causes me to lose track of time so hard that I forget time ever existed. Time doesn’t matter. It is only breath, movement, and rock, and each of these has a tangible impact on the challenge in front of me.
I can no longer tolerate time spent doing anything I can’t feel in my bones. Climbing has outlasted every job I’ve ever had. Something about the constant cycle of clearing an email inbox and bouncing around software platforms leaves me exhausted and unsatisfied. None of this feels real. These rules and systems are just things we made up.
And sure, climbing has its share of made-up rules, but when I’m truly invested in a climb, those rules are completely irrelevant. The feeling I’m talking about is deeper. It’s the feeling of trusting a tiny foothold to move upwards on a granite slab 500 feet above the valley floor. It’s the feeling of moving with calculated confidence through a runout on sandy red rock. It’s a deep breath after a crux and a moment to soak in the view of the expansiveness around you, recharging your body and mind before continuing the climb. In these moments, I feel absolutely infinite, as if my body does not have boundaries–I am connected to the air and the rock around me. I take on a curious mindset, and as I move more and more fluidly, my self-doubt cannot keep up. Without the mental chatter that clouds my life on the ground, I am free to trust myself wholly. In this pure space, I tap in to what my mind and body are truly capable of.
Now, when I find myself staring out of windows during work meetings or struggling to focus on a friend's story, I wonder if this life would have been easier for me if I never found climbing. Would I have more stamina for time spent sitting and staring and solving abstract problems if I’d never known that something deeper exists? If I didn’t know it was possible to feel this alive, would it be easier to find contentment in the societal systems that feel so made up to me now? If I didn’t know life could be more, would I be happier with accepting less?
Sometimes I wonder if I am missing something. From the outside, it looks like other people are much more capable of settling into contentment. I have friends who have worked the same job since graduation. I know people who chose to put down roots in the city they were born in. I will never get to know what that type of life is like, but I can’t help but wonder if things would be easier if I could put my head down and quit asking myself for more.
The feeling of passionate pursuit that I find in climbing sets the bar high for everything else in life. I can’t keep myself from searching for the truest friendships and the most gratifying work. I want to skip the small talk and dive right in to heart-level connection. I just want to live a life I can feel. Climbing has shown me what it means to feel truly, deeply, alive. I don’t know if climbing saved my life or wrecked it, but at this point, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
