Why do I climb?
As an avid climber and aspiring alpinist, my most important task has been explaining to others, who are not climbers, why anyone would want to want to put themselves in such seemingly immediate danger. Places where one foot slip, one misstep, or a broken rock would mean certain death. Every climber puts themselves in positions such as this, but it is always in varying degrees. Climbing is a unique sport, in which, unlike any other sport, the consequences of death are all around you, objective danger is all around you. For the most part, your own safety and destiny is in your control.
The notch couloir on Longs Peak
This is of course not always the case with objective dangers. Oftentimes things happen that are outside of our control. To me, taking a very dangerous environment and feeling “comfortable” in it is something that is very attractive to certain personalities. To start, it is important for me to explain my perspective on human exploration. In my opinion, humans have it wired inside to explore to new, unknown, and dangerous places. If this wasn’t the case, many major feats of human exploration around the globe would have never happened. What drove Shackleton to explore the frozen iceberg waves of the Antarctic? What would have driven Lewis and Clark to explore and push the expansion to the western United States? Humans are naturally curious, and this is the same feeling I have had inside of me since I was a child.
As a child, I adored aviation. I would look up into the sky of contrails jetting by in the deep blue and wish I could be up there experiencing the wonders of flight; seeing the world from below, feeling the affects of being airborne on my body. My curiosity of wondering what it was like up at 30,000ft; looking out at the clouds and back to earth, down at all the tiny buildings, cars, and objects from below. Now, when I look up a a distant white-encased icy peak with rock architecture such as something from Mordor; I stare at it, wondering what it would be like to be in that environment, looking down below me to my all too familiar world.
Speaking of mountain architecture, I might add that the structure of mountains, how they are shaped, rock formations, the grandeur, and the “ora” of the mountain all are huge factor in what I want to climb, and why. To me, every mountain I encounter has a “personality”, and that personality it carries with it encompasses its shape, height, architecture, weather systems (amount of snow and ice it receives) , its location, and oververall ora and presence. A mountain’s “personality” is permanently encased in my memory, just like a human personality.
Looking back on myself as a child, I would say I was very anxious. I would have occasional panic attacks, for no apparent reason, and worry about seemingly meaningless things. I would say that I think about the average “thought” with above average intensity. Thoughts stay with me, and some thoughts stay with me for far too long. I can’t say weather I have an “overactive mind”, more than any other mind because obviously my mind is the only mind I have ever experienced, so I can only judge my experience based off of what I have verbally explored with other humans. To put all this nonsense together, climbing, like no other activity I have experienced, allows me to live in the absolute present. Now, I understand the majority probably has an activity in which they experience the same. When it comes to climbing, is there any other activity in which you are going to be more focused on when it comes to life or death? Now, I understand this is a very simplistic view, and most of the time climbers aren’t really one foot slip away from death, however, your subconscious mind doesn’t know the difference, so the level of focus is still the same.
I have always been attracted to obscure things in my life, and early on I realized I definitely was not going to fit into the typical “mold” of what our society wants us to be. So, it was either try and mold myself into this shape, or embrace it. Even further, explore paths not only less traveled, but paths not yet created. Back in high school, while every other typical teenager was playing football and going to parties, I was at the gym, getting better at this new and unusual sport called “CrossFit” (now not that unknown). Today, what attracts me about climbing is it attracts odd, and unusual personality types. For reasons that are not known, I have met more unusual personalities through the climbing community than anywhere else, and I embrace this part of the sport. Society never questions why people play football, or why people love to ski. It’s just accepted. I can’t tell you how many times people ask me why I climb, and one of my favorite responses is “If you have to ask why, you’ll never understand”
One last aspect of climbing that is so attractive to me is the partnerships. In my experience, there is a form of heightened bonding between human beings when they both have to suffer together. I can’t explain this on a deeper psychological level, however when two humans are in a very harsh situation, the sense of reliance, trust, and openness is on a level not experienced through casual everyday interaction. I know if I can trust someone on the side of a mountain while snowing and in sub-zero temperatures, trusting them in everyday casual life will be a cakewalk. When humans share adventurous, deep, meaningful experiences with each other, they learn to grow not only with themselves, but together as well.
To wrap things up, climbing is an activity that will always be relentlessly questioned, and ridiculed. Every climber has different reasons for why they do it, and are all equally important. My hope is through this post that one does not view climbers as “above”, or “better” than anyone else, but using climbing to elevate their human existence to the highest degree. Humans have always had a deep connection with nature, and climbing is a wonderful way to reconnect with what has been seemingly lost in our modern, concrete world.
