I was on my annual hiking trip last week and we tried rock climbing for the first time. A little background; it took my hiking buddies five years to convince me to do this, let me re-phrase this for me to convince my Self to do this. When I was asked the question I sat back and thought, why am I saying no? Is it because this is my habituated response? The answer, yes possibly. Is this because I like saying no just to get a response and engage in the dialogue of cajoling; perhaps. What belief do I hold about rock climbing, something I know really very little about? So I decided to say yes.
Then came the day, as it turned out I missed the early part of our guide’s talk as I had to move my car, you know all the stuff about the dangers of rock climbing, pretty clever on my part don’t you think? And as it happens I ended up going first… not part of my original plan. The night before we met a couple where we were staying and the woman told us when we are in the experience the only thing we would find ourselves thinking about is where our foot or hand will go for the next move, everything else would disappear.
On the first climb, my first experience of intellect and body came when I had to learn how to descend, which meant leaning away from the rock and letting go completely.
