Life's one big competition

In order to be great you have to look at life as one big competition, always trying to be better than the one next to you. Being too competitive can make it hard to gain friendships; most don’t appreciate the mental and physical ‘one up-menship’. Then again, life is full of sacrifices, and you must be willing to ‘five up’ some things in life in order to excel towards your goals or for that matter your potential. This has always been a fault of mine, but my fault has also been my strength. It allows me to out climb the average climber in just a few years. Coincidentally, it’s also allowed me to see my true friends. After all, true friends stick around for the edgy sides of your strengths, not just the polite and acceptable. I mean, this is rock climbing not a tea party for God’s sake. In the last year I learned, well lets just say I’m beginning to learn, you can’t take life too seriously and sometimes when you just stop caring whether you send the climb, is when your really climbing. You must be able to focus and still have fun. It’s a fine line walking between focus and fun, too much of either and you might F* up. Before I get on a climb I always go through every movement, even the easy ones, I imagine each movement, each muscle, and I mentally engage with each movement. I go through the climb in my head as if I was running through one of my routines from gymnastics before I saluted the judges in a competition. When I’m still unsure of how I might be able to make a move I run through all the alternatives, and I mean ALL of them (whether I may be strong enough at the time to do it), each hand placements, each foot placement. I may not even touch the rock before I mentally climbed a route twenty different ways. Most importantly when I execute every movement, I may feel scared, but there is an important and vital disconnect between feeling and doing because up there, up there in my mind? There is nothing but silence. Just focus on climbing, there isn’t much room for anything more. After I reach the top then I can feel the fear. Case in point, when I’m bouldering. I am the most uncomfortable with this style of climbing. Take away the confidence of my rope, leave me with a free fall, you’re your crazy if you don’t feel a little fear.  When I am unable to drown out the fear and doubts I don’t get to the top. I can see now when the tables are turned, no longer the active role and instead the teacher, I see the fear manifested in someone else. Being the teacher, something I am not very good at mostly because I get too excited and forget I’m teaching and the focus turns from the climb to the person I’m instructing, I guess this is where my gymnastics training really comes into play. Seeing the newer climbers I teach struggle with the mental preparedness that comes so naturally to me I find myself unsure of how to really teach; to let them into my world where they drown out all surroundings and just climb. Focus on feet, hands, body positions, and each muscle engaging with each movement. I don’t know if this is something you teach or if it’s just something you learn to do. But I am trying to find ways to share this skill and pass it on. Who knows, maybe play leads to creativity, creativity to innovation and my new little climbers mind’s will start ‘seeing’ the way I see . Or maybe they’ll just keep hitting the pad two moves in with me rolling my eyes thinking, ‘really?’. The lesson for today is: drown out external surroundings and focus on the internal momentum of what ever your passion.