I’m lying on my back, staring up at the light filtering its way to me through the leaves of an oak tree. Dust motes, illuminated by the afternoon sun, float like dancers through the air.
It’s hot today. The sun has been baking The Valley floor all day, but my spot under this tree, lying on a crash pad is peaceful and cool.
I have just failed at another attempt on a boulder problem in Yosemite Valley. It is my first time bouldering outside and I have been thoroughly beaten by this slippery, balancey V2.
I have been lying here, staring at the beautiful canopy above me, for 15 minutes before I realize that I have been lying here, staring at the beautiful canopy above me for 15 minutes.
I sit up and rub my eyes, feeling dazed. It’s the first time I can remember feeling so calm.
I struggle with depression and anxiety. I get trapped by my thoughts as they race to create a prison around me. It is an active part of my day to dismantle these fears, set them aside, and say “Not today.” I have been in therapy, I have been meditating, I have tried giving up coffee and alcohol, and sugar. I have said my daily affirmations and journaled until my eyes wore out and my fingers ached. But no matter what I do, it is an active practice to pull my mind out of the darkness and into the light.
And sitting here, next to this unyielding slab of granite, is the first time I taste this kind of peace. The calm is effortless. My body spent, my mind relaxes and unwinds, getting lost in the beauty of afternoon sunlight playing in the tree branches.
It turns out that the best feeling in the world is not joy, or even ecstasy, but the absence of pain.
After that illuminating first outdoor bouldering session, I spend the next three years trying to find the calm again. And ultimately I leave my hometown and move into my van to pursue rock climbing full time. When I do, it’s like color comes into my life for the first time. I do my first trad lead on the South Six Shooter in Indian Creek, but the inhalation of breath at the top is cool and crisp. I have never tasted air so sweet.
I spend a season learning to trad climb in Yosemite Valley. I didn’t know my body had this much capacity for joy.
For the first time in my life food tastes richer, water feels colder, friendships feel deeper. Sunsets paint the sky unbelievable colors, and the starlight that keeps me company around every campfire is pristine and glorious.
Climbing took me through the other side of my mental health and showed me a world where I could rest easy with my mind.
The exhilaration of clipping the chains, the strength that flowed through my new hardening body, the self-assuredness of my own ability, it was intoxicating and beautiful and new and it made the sickness in my head fade into the background. Every climb sent helped me push it a little bit farther back.
But it did not, as much as I wish, make it disappear.
I can’t always climb. There are trips to see aging grandparents, and visits to friends' houses in LA. There are sick days and bad weather and bad timing.
When it comes, I can feel it coming from a mile away, like bad weather on the horizon. I’m sitting in the tall grass with the sun on my skin, but the dark clouds are there, and I know they are coming my way. It’s a slow pull into nothingness. And it's terrifying.
It doesn’t come as a storm. There is no raging thunder or the strike of lightning. It’s a slow creep of grey mist.
In the worst moments, I feel nothing but dread. Being awake feels like an unbearable burden. Feeding myself, bathing, even putting on clothes is nearly impossible. And there is an ache in my chest, a deep throbbing sorrow, that never goes away.
And in the depths of it, climbing can bring me back, although momentarily. Pushing myself on a climb acts as a life raft in the sea of grey fog, and for a few glorious hours, I am at peace again. I break through the surface and am buoyed along by the ache in my fingers and the soreness of my muscles. I can lie on my back, staring at the light filtering through the canopy of leaves above me, and let my mind unspool itself gently onto the crash pad next to me.
I have wrapped my whole life up in climbing.
It feels purposeful and powerful like it’s the only thing worth doing with my life.
And sometimes I wonder if I am trapped in it.
If I stand at the fork in the road between climbing and depression, how can I ever choose not to climb?
It’s not a choice. It never was. I will always choose color and brightness. I will always choose joy. I will always choose life.
When people say they have found their life’s passion, I wonder if this is what they mean. To not be able to live without it? I have dedicated my life to rock climbing. It fuels me and compels me in more ways than I have words for… and sometimes it really feels like I will die without it.
Did I choose climbing as my life’s passion or did it choose me? What is the difference between a passion and an obsession? And at the end of the day does it really matter whether I am climbing because I love it, or if I am climbing because I can’t do anything else?