A Different Path
Dear Steph,
First off I wanted to thank you for all the helpful information on your blog, and your book is amazing and insiteful and helped me through a lot! My name is Matt I have been climbing now for about 6 years much to the dismay of my family. I am 22 years old and am trying to figure out what to do with my life. I am from a very conservative Utah suburb and It seems to me all my friends and peers are chasing college degrees and things that do not sound appealing to me. Then there I am with my long scraggly beard, climbing as always. College seems like it should be important but I figure I will go at my own pace, lest I go completely insane! In a few weeks I am hitting the road for a while to hopefully figure some things out in my head but with the main focus on climbing. 1st question: when you were in college how did you balance work and school and still find time to climb? 2nd question: What ways have you found are easiest to find a climbing partner (Either where you live or on the road)? And 3rd I have been wanting to take up yoga to improve my core strength and relaxation what is a good way to get started.
Thanks for any input, I know it must be hard to answer everyone’s questions!!!
Matt
Dear Matt,
I hope you had a great summer roadtrip, and that it answered some of your questions. It’s pretty hard to balance family/societal expectations and what you feel inside sometimes. When I was in college, I was a literature major, so it was pretty easy to balance school and climbing. You can read and write pretty much anywhere, and I have always found that I enjoy climbing more when I am not climbing ALL THE TIME. For me, it’s really good to do other things, in order to have some kind of balance.
Finding climbing partners can either be ridiculously easy or ridiculously hard. For sure, the best thing is to have a designated friend that you will meet up with. But depending on where you are going, it can also be fine to just show up and meet people, which leads to having more friends that you will meet up with next time…. Honestly, I don’t think one is better than the other. I like both.
And lastly, if you want to start doing yoga, get the B.K.S. Iyengar book, “Light on Yoga” and take some yoga classes as well. After that, you should have enough understanding to continue with classes or to start practicing by yourself if that fits better with your lifestyle (if you are living at a crag).
Don’t worry if you are confused a lot. Everybody is. 😉
Steph
