I wish I may I wish I might, have the courage, my fears to fight.

     I wish I could climb without fear. For me, on every climb my mind is consumed with an irrational fear of falling. Will I deck? How far will I fall? Will it hurt? Will my leg get tangled in the rope mid fall and burn half my calf off? Seems kind of funny... I know, for someone who has been climbing for 15 years to still be afraid of something as inevitable as falling. But It’s true. 

     It’s a bit embarrassing to talk about actually, because I don’t like to appear as weak.... especially to the people I coach, the people I look up to and the people I compete against. Hah! Yet here I am writing a blog post about fear as a weakness... Why? Because I’m a firm believer that the easiest way to conquer fear is by talking about it. It’s like Psychology 101, after denial the first step is admitting you have a problem! Who knows, maybe some of my readers share my deep & dark scaredy-pants secret too.

     I want to be able to attack routes and climb them without hesitation or restraint, but instead my first attempts often go something like this: Nervously and carefully climb to clip 1, take a deep breath, shake out and try to keep my cool. Clip 2 is my least favorite clip...I always think I am going to deck. Unless it’s a jug haul or a crimp haven, I hesitate. Sometimes I stretch myself as far as I can to see, if by some miracle, I can possibly reach the next bolt from within my comfort zone. Flail. Stress. Freak. Take. Cry. Lower. Fume. Wonder... What the hell is wrong with me and why do I even climb!?

I am at an inner war with myself after this cycle. “The route isn’t even that hard!” I’ll tell myself. “But the clip is a bit hard to make, the holds aren’t that good...” Sending angel on my left shoulder, Devil on the right. 

     So, do you know what I did last weekend? After my horrible fear-infested first attempt on Tango, 12a, I top roped the same line five times. FIVE times! Normally I feel like a spayed dog wearing a cone around her head with her tail tucked between her legs when I top rope. It is the utter state of embarrassment for me because it clearly displays that I am too afraid to climb the route properly. But last weekend, the only person I had to display my weakness to was Wolf. I didn’t have to impress him....and I didn’t feel like I had to impress myself either. After a month of plastic training for the Munich world cup and a shitty two weeks spent recovering from the plague, should I have really expected to pull on rope feeling like a champ? 

     When people are scared their bodies hunch over and shrink into themselves. They become smaller, they breath more rapidly and their attitude shifts to defense mode. How the hell are you supposed to climb well in this physical state!? I was so fed up with feeling terrified on these entirely do-able but challenging moves ...and I just wanted to climb. So I did! I tucked my tail and I repeated the line. over and over again. I dialed every foot placement, every transition. I even smiled and had fun rocking the TR. 

typical freaked out Jelly clipping position, Kalymnos

     But even after everything was perfected I still didn’t feel like leading it... I wasn’t in a frame of mind where I could push myself mentally without breaking. Of course my decision was disappointing, but It took throwing the towel in this weekend to make me realize just how much work goes into mental preparation and how imperative it is for success, at least in my case.I can’t just blindly hop on a route without any mental preparation and expect to climb it fearlessly... even though I often climb in this way. Probably because I’ve watched so many amazing climbers never think twice about falling. They try their hardest on impressive grades, take huge whippers and shrug it off like it’s nothing. I should be like them too! But when I suck it up and try to be tough I usually end up beating myself up about it when I don’t meet my expectations of a fearless, confident and strong performance. 

     So I’ve spent the last couple days thinking about this issue. Here’s what I’ve come up with. I’m not like other climbers... I’m like me. And I am afraid. I’ve been climbing almost my entire life rehearsing sequences and visualizing success for the send when all along fear has been the real culprit. Fear kicks me off the wall ten times more often than any other slip up and I guess I’m just starting to admit that now... Next... on to stage 3! 

Denial. Admitting.Coping

Ps. If anyone has experiences or advice on how they cope with their fears when climbing, please comment below! I'd love to read about them!

Thanks as always to my amazing sponsors for supporting a scaredy-cat!

Evolv

Flashed Climbing

Calgary Climbing Center

Feeling happy at the Tavern Crag in Lilienfeld

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Jelisa Dunbar