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Background: I’ve started to do core skills reflections, which is to say that I take note of the deeper lessons in daily tasks. The way that core skills were explained to me was through analogy. In math, rather than solving problems from rote memorization or in isolation from one another, you strive to understand the theory, and to make connections. The core skills in life are the patterns underneath the surface; the lessons implicit in the ordinary. This is part 1 of an ongoing series of unbounded length: rock climbing and separating the action from the intent.

Begin

In rock climbing, the hand and footholds are marked with different colored tapes. The starting position is marked with a tag, which includes the tape color and an indicator of the level of difficulty for that problem. The goal is to begin on the starting hold, use only the holds marked with the color of that problem, and make it to the top.[1] There are different levels of difficulty, starting from V0, and the highest one I’ve seen in person is a V11.

For nearly 3 weeks, I had been climbing predominantly V0s. I had also worked through a single V1 and accomplished a single V2. But on July 2, my abilities skyrocketed: I climbed three V1s and one V2. I’m about to explain a shift in thinking, which caused this steep improvement.

I started climbing a V1, and got stuck a few times. It helps to have someone on the ground to help; a friend can call out footholds I can’t see anymore, and generally give encouragement that’s surprisingly helpful when I’m holding on with muscles straining, untethered and 15 feet up a wall. I asked a climbing expert to come check out the problem with me.[2]

I felt a mental discomfort as I led him to the problem—I was wasting his time with a trivial little thing. I resolved not to give up so easily; I deliberately committed to make it to the top. Then I began. It started out challenging and only escalated. There were times I got tired; my legs shook from the strain, my arms screamed at the abuse. At these moments, I was tempted to give up, and carefully let go in order to fall to the mat in a controlled manner.

But I remembered a quote I saw at the rock gym: you aren’t done when you get tired; you’re finished when you fall.[3] So I pressed on. I did slip once, near the top; my dominant hand went flying backward, and pulled the leg on the same side off the wall too—but I held. I gripped with my left hand, and struggled to grab the handhold I lost, my foot following back to the wall. After all four limbs were safely on the wall, I allowed myself a brief moment to breathe—a mistake, because every pause took energy to maintain and increased the exhaustion.

Instead of dropping and quitting the problem there, I thought again: I must finish this to the end. There was one final move; a move which would have daunted me before. I had to haul myself over the top with only one handhold, with my other arm thrown over the smooth, downward sloped surface. I pulled and strained, and propelled upward with my legs, supported on feet which I had to trust would not slip from the holds, until I finally flopped over the edge.

I giddily walked over toward the descent area to climb down, feeling triumphant—and then a new sensation altogether. I had the concept of core skills salient in my mind, and I pieced together the lesson I learned.

Like I thought to myself before, the winning attitude isn’t “I’ll stop when I’m tired”; it’s “I’ll keep going until I succeed.” I don’t think to myself, “Well, I’ll put my hands and feet on the wall, move around, and go in the upward direction.” No, I instead say, “I will make it to the top.”

Extending this to other aspects of life is marvelously simple. Instead of, “I’ll sit here and read 30 pages of this textbook,” it’s “I will understand this material.”

I call this pattern separating the intent from the action.

This is a useful framing to remind myself why I’m doing what I’m doing. Losing sight of the reason behind the actions I’m doing makes me lethargic and slow; I just go through the motions without purpose or direction. Keeping the intent in mind makes me laser focused, sharp and efficient, and determined to get even my small tasks done.

By applying this framing, I’ve been able to focus for up to 3 hours at a time with absolutely no breaks; no idly checking email or Facebook, no spacing out for a second only to compulsively check for more news. It works because I focus my intent on finishing a task, cross it off the list, and move onto the next one, which I am now just as intent on completing.

It’s also how I finished writing this post.

Notes

[1] What I’m calling rock climbing is actually bouldering. The difference, as I understand it, is that rock climbing is done while wearing harnesses and spans greater heights, while bouldering involves problems less than 20 feet tall and participants fall onto mats.

[2] By expert, I mean a friend who consistently climbs V8s.

[3] This is paraphrased from memory. It probably isn’t accurate.

Thanks to Joseph Gnehm for reading drafts of this.