Blog

Fear and Climbing

• March 2015
• Climb Training

Hi Steph,
I would love to get your feedback and insights into some questions that came to my mind when I was climbing this past week-end regarding fear.

Fear is rational, and it’s totally rational for it to kick-in climbing. What’s not rational is when it starts to take power, and then control over my thoughts as I’m climbing. I start assessing, I may fall here, gosh that won’t be fun, and instead of thinking of just committing to the moves, finding my breath, and remaining calm; the opposite can kick-in. It often starts making me more tired than I normally would be. At the end of the day, this happens when I’m not confident or if I feel weak. I’ve had bad past experiences with belayers, falls, etc. which have planted doubts in my mind. I’ve tried really hard to assess these, and think of ways through them so they do not become part of my thought process when I’m on the rock. However, some have shaken my confidence.

I started thinking about confidence and fear, and how to overcome fear, while still remaining aware of the risks. I remember in the Warrior Way book, he talks a lot of committing to the decision once you have assessed the risk.

I hope some of these comments make sense, and I’m hoping you would share some insight into how you: build moments of confidence, shake off bad outcomes, and commit fully in the moment so you can achieve success? Any other thoughts I’ve drummed up, please share those as well:)

Thank you for your blog and presence in the climbing community.
Best,
Lana

Hi Lana,
Thank you for writing to me, and for your thoughts and questions! Fear is one of the most powerful emotions we have. It’s part of why climbing is good for us, I think. You raise a lot of great ideas, and the one I want to start with is your past bad experiences with belayers and falls. I’ve seen a big change in climbing over the last 10 years, with the increase of climbing gyms and popularity of sport climbing areas. Often it’s considered normal now to climb with people you don’t know very well, and there’s also what I would call an increased casualness about belaying. I know for myself, it’s very difficult for me to trust people to belay me if I’m climbing anything that’s at all difficult for me. There are certain people I know well and whom I trust, but I notice a distinct difference in my willingness to go for it and try to the point of falling if I don’t have one of these friends belaying me. So you may feel as though you’re irrationally afraid while climbing, but take a step back and ask yourself what your relationship is with your belayer. Is this someone you know really well, whom you have seen belaying safely and attentively, and whom you trust? If not, then it’s perfectly legitimate to feel doubtful. It’s a really good idea to watch people belaying before you ask them for a catch. If you don’t like what you see, then you know you shouldn’t ask them to belay you. If you do like what you see, you’ll probably feel a lot more confident on the sharp end, knowing they’re reliable and competent.

Feeling weak is another very legitimate reason to feel afraid when climbing. I always lack confidence when I feel weak, and it’s a big part of the reason I do hangboard and campus workouts and trail runs, so that I’ll feel good and have a good time when I’m climbing. If you know you don’t have the strength to hold on, it’s perfectly natural to have anxiety about pushing on if you’re feeling tired already. Training for climbing has countless benefits, and not least of which is that it will increase your confidence. If you know you have that little bit of extra power or endurance when you need to pull a hard move to get to a rest or make a strenuous clip, you will be a lot less afraid. I highly recommend choosing one type of additional climbing specific training and also committing to cardiovascular training, and trying it out for a month or 2.

I also highly recommend taking it easy on yourself. If you’re afraid and you’re not having fun leading because of it, don’t feel that you have to force yourself to lead at your limit. Often it will actually make things worse, and make you feel bad about climbing and about yourself. If you’re in this place, get on the sharp end on routes that you know or that are well within your ability. Try harder routes on toprope. Find a project that you like and with clips in safe and reasonable places and start working on it. Keep in mind that you’ll be climbing for a long time, and you’ll go through a lot of different phases in that time. The important thing is to enjoy it and find the place that feels right to you. You’ll have phases where you want to push yourself, physically or mentally, and then you will. But don’t force it–set yourself up for success and focus on what feels right to you.
🙂 Steph