As I have mentioned in previous journal entries, I take a yearly trip to a spa with a group of grand women. Every year the experience varies and there are different options to choose from. When I called in to create my itinerary for the trip it occurred to me that I have always avoided doing any of the challenge courses offered. They are high up, scary, and well, challenging… not exactly a spa vibe. Up until this point in my visits I have chosen relaxing activities like floating meditation. But lately what I have been feeling in my body is a sense of anxiety and fear, a constant, mild, tightness in my chest, that ranges from a quiet white noise that can blend into the background to a loud siren that cannot be ignored. I am familiar with this anxiety, this tightness in my chest, because it was with me for years, starting as early as I can remember. I was so afraid my mom would die young, until my mom passed away. I think I always knew the time with my mom would be limited and she was my person. The curse of a big anxiety coming true is the longlasting games it plays with my mind. There is a part of me that is convinced all my anxieties are real – predictions of the future. I know my gut and intuition are important to honor – the intense messages at times have very useful information. But honoring my gut messages versus letting anxiety limit my life are two different paths, although sometimes I cannot decipher where I am in the process. An odd thing happened once my mom passed away, there was a release of the tension in my chest. The day I had feared for years was here and my focus shifted to how to live with the reality of this inevitable loss rather than being anxious it would come. Life continued and the tightness released.
I am not sure what has triggered the return of the feeling in my chest, maybe just another gift of perimenopause, but it is back. In addition to my fear of heights, my tremor gets much worse with stress and I literally shake in my hands and legs when I am feeling fearful. When my tremor is present it is another example of my lack of control. The inability to control my physical body, the inability to keep my loved ones safe, these are the greatest anxieties I face – these are the triggers for the tightness in my chest, and these anxieties are truths of life, control is an illusion and we are all mortal.
So, in addition to doing some floating meditation, I decided to do something really scary because recently I haven’t been able to silence my fears, to control the tightness in my chest, therefore I decided to do scary shit and see what I would learn from the experience!
The Sky Island Traverse experience – as stated in the activity guide was created to help guests “break through perceived limits by challenging yourself physically, mentally, and emotionally. Reflect on your journey of self-discovery as you conclude by gliding into the grounding embrace of the desert floor.” Let me take you through my journey:
It was already hot at 10:30 am in the Tucson desert. The valley has had more rain than usual this spring and the Catalina mountains were lush and green in the distance. The air smelled of creosote, a desert shrub that carries the scent of rain. The group walked along the dirt path out to the area where the Sky Island Traverse exists. Since I was at a spa and in a mindful mode, I worked to focus on the crunch of the path and the dust from my feet, not the nausea in my stomach from the challenge course that lies ahead.
After thorough safety explanations and putting on our harnesses, we were ready to begin. The first task to accomplish was to climb to the top of a 12 foot ladder leaning on a telephone pole. Once at the top of the ladder, you transferred to climb up the telephone pole using metal holds. Step by step, rung by rung, and hold by hold – I reached the top of the pole (worth noting– the top of the pole was 5 stories in the air). Arriving at the top I climbed around the edge of the platform to survey the view . The view was breathtaking, the mountains were a backdrop to the spring desert beauty. The trees were beginning to leaf and there was an initial sense of accomplishment for just climbing the pole, it felt worth it for this view.
As I noticed the trees, my mind started to focus on how high above those trees I was and the beauty and accomplishment of climbing quickly transitioned to “oh shit, climbing up was going to be the easiest thing in this experience”. I looked over to my right and realized we would eventually be ziplining off this platform five stories in the air to “embrace the desert floor…” my nausea was front and center at this point and my hands were far from steady. I decided my mind could not comprehend jumping off this platform, harnessed or not, and so I shifted my focus to the obstacles we were tasked with accomplishing prior to gliding. The obstacles were designed as a loop to take you away from the platform and bring you back to the platform once completed. We had two clips attached to our harness and they needed to be unclipped one by one and re-clipped onto the next safety rope for each obstacle, you checked their direction was opposite and verified the hold of the ropes methodically with each new obstacle. I was thankful that there was a safety process to focus on, it kept my mind busy with the order of the protocols and the tasks, instead of how high I was from the tops of the trees. I took a deep breath to calm myself, and moved my clips to the first obstacle.
It took some convincing to step off the platform onto the first obstacle. My mind was already protesting the act of standing on the platform in the air, so stepping off the platform onto a metal wire while holding ropes was a serious push. The great thing about the first obstacle was it was steady, the ropes were on both sides, reaching up from the metal wire below to wires above in a v shape, spaced a couple feet apart, you walked along the wire below, steadying yourself with the ropes on either side. The wire was taught, the ropes were taught and other than having to step down off the stable platform onto the wire and reaching from one rope to the next the obstacle felt manageable. One down… unclip one, clip one, unclip two, clip two, check the direction and the hold, onto the next obstacle.
Obstacle two was not steady… obstacle two was several wooden slats with spaces in between them, hanging from loose ropes, each slat was a swing. I stepped onto the first board and it moved, it moved a lot. I called ahead to one of our guides and said to Tika “This is moving a lot,” hoping she was going to have some awesome tip to help me steady the swing. She smiled and said, “It’s going to move, you have to get comfortable with the movement.” This moment was profound. I had to accept the movement and go forward, I had to keep grabbing for the next rope, placing my foot on the next board, and know the whole thing was going to constantly swing. A great metaphor for life – it is always going to move, you have a choice to keep going forward or stay where you are but you cannot control the movement. Tikka asked in the middle of it if she could take my picture. There I was five stories up on swinging boards holding on to ropes and trying to deal with the ridiculousness of the whole thing, because truly I chose this – “sure take my picture,” I said. I started to laugh and thought of Aiden, my daughter, when she is proud of herself, Mom take my picture… and there was something so kind about Tikka offering to take a picture to mark this moment, it was so scary, and also kind of badass that on these damn swinging boards, I hadn’t quit, I had accepted the movement, and Tikka was a witness to this feat. Obstacle two was filled with lessons. Unclip one, clip one, unclip two, clip two, check the direction and the hold…
Obstacle three looked scary but was actually far more steady and felt like walking on a dock. There were several squares of wood, probably three feet square with slats, with spaces in between the squares, they were linked together by ropes and there were guide ropes along the side to grab onto as you walked across. They bounced up and down as you walked on them but if you placed your foot in the middle of the square they stayed fairly steady and this felt okay… the bouncing was actually kind of fun. Unclip one, clip one, unclip two, clip two, check the direction and the hold…
Obstacle four was set up with multiple plastic triangles hanging overhead like monkey bars in a park, there was a metal wire underneath enough of a distance below to make it a stretch and a very loose rope over to the left side. Some kids growing up could glide across the monkey bars with ease, I was not that kid. This obstacle had an additional challenge: Katie, the person in front of me, was stuck and was terrified to move through. As I joined her on the tiny platform in front of the obstacle, I checked in with her. “Do you have childhood monkey bar issues too?” I asked. she replied, “Yes” she was afraid she wouldn’t have the strength to get across. I was acutely aware of what she was thinking because I too was having similar thoughts. The thing was we didn’t have to use the monkey bars. There was a loose rope to the side we could grab and we had the tether of our harness to balance on so we could complete the obstacle without using the plastic triangles. Screw those yellow triangles swinging there and taunting our inner child for embarrassments from years ago that we still carried. We chose together we didn’t have to be limited by our monkey bar pasts and we could navigate the obstacle our own way. Focusing on supporting Katie helped me to be brave. Our past experiences joined us together in community and together we supported each other to move through the obstacle. I loved watching Katie decide to move forward, move beyond her limitations, and do it in her own way. Her bravery inspired me as well and viola all four obstacles had been completed. Unclip one, clip one, unclip two, clip two, check the directions and the hold… I was now tethered back to the platform and had to face the dilemma of getting down.
I was terrified to zipline off the platform. Looking into the desert at the length of the zipline, the height we were jumping off, all of it felt wrong. While it all felt wrong and scary, I thought back to a conversation I had with my husband earlier when he had told me to go have fun. Our amazing guides Tikka, Don, and Dave had continually instructed us to have fun. Fun is not automatic to me, even as a child fun was a stretch. So here I was facing a major fear and deciding that not only was I going to step off this platform but I was going to find fun in the fear. We tested our harnesses, our last: unclip one, clip one, unclip two, clip two, check the directions and hold. Now we were harnessed to the zipline. Our instructor Dave informed us that once we decided to go we had to really go, without hesitation, all momentum moving forward. I try to be compliant when someone is instructing me on safety but the thought of truly pushing forward off the platform without hesitation onto the zip line was literally inconceivable. So while my brain could not compute the why, Dave provided me the how, and I simply had to trust. My partner and I counted down from ten, it is amazing all the thoughts you can have in ten seconds, between 8 and 7 I came to the realization, thinking was not going to help, the only thing that was going to help now was to focus on the fact that I had committed to my partner that we were going to push off this platform at 1, 1 came and I pushed forward… My immediate reaction was pure joy, no tightness, no fear, just pure joy at gliding through the air and facing a major fear, I was laughing with the lightness of it all, I was also laughing because my partner was calling back to the platform that everyone who told her it wasn’t a drop off was a fucking liar. I had found fun in the fear.
Accepting that I will always carry fear and anxieties with me is necessary because it is my truth. I am blessed to have wonderful gifts in my life that would be painful to lose: my family, my health. And while I would love to be enlightened and accept that everything is temporary, I also know the grief of losing those that you love dearly. Despite it all, I found space for joy and fun during the Sky Island Traverse Experience. I was able to connect with Katie and understand how our past and the scars we carry can be ways to come together in community and create a collective strength to move through challenges. May is the time of year that marks the end of school and graduations and the passage of time in obvious ways. The footing continues to move, time continues on, and we can choose to support each other to hang on, push forward, and find joy, happiness, and laughter amidst the movement and uncertainty.
