Sensation
I had this very strange sensation today of just happiness, while sitting in my kitchen sipping coffee.
As I grew aware of it, I tried to consciously study it, even shake it off, and figure out what is up.
I had not taken any drugs, recreational or medical, except a painkiller and bloodthinner four hours prior. And it lingered. I felt kind of elated, as if I had done something great, something complete, and I was just smiling and feeling good. Is this the opposite of what people with depression feel? A rapid onset of an inexplicable emotion? 🤔
Analyzing my past few minutes before the sensation, I realized I looked at Instagram which for me, these days, is almost entirely full of climbing and BJJ reels and posts (as it should be). And I saw three notable posts, one after another.
The first was by boulderingplanet reposting imogenclimbs in a very powerful but neutral (?!) pose.
In the past few months I had grown to really love the human form. I am mesmerized by healthy, well built, non-pumped muscles, functional leanness that allows a human to achieve physical greatness, like epic feats of climbing. This photo was just inspirational in some way, it was like looking at a perfect painting at the perfect time. It felt good to see it.
The second post was Anna Hazelnut’s celebratory one about reaching 30k subs on YT (a travesty, she should be at 300k).
Anna is known for having the disposition of a 🌈 🦄unicorn🦄🌈 and brings light and enthusiasm and happiness to every video she is in. She seems like a person who would be genuinely fun to hang out with, even if she would try to climb everything around you.
In the photo, she hugs herself (how very Anna) and smiles exhaustedly at the camera, in a way that only a climber after a session can — scraped, bruised, chalked, and happy.
A few scrolls further, there was Mikey Musumeci in a roll session with some buddies, and it brought back thoughts of his Joe Rogan episode. If you ever want to see what real love and passion for something sounds and looks like, and what unbridled optimism, watch that episode. Mikey is to BJJ what Anna is to climbing.
And as I was sitting there, grinning, feeling all warm inside in a very alien way, I realized what it was that made me so happy even thinking about these people and these two sports I love (and am not very good at).
It is the perfect exhaustion.
I often say climbing is like playing chess with the human body against a pre-programmed opponent. Climbing is single player body chess.
BJJ needs the exact same muscles and stretching, grip strength, it all matches, but jiu-jitsu is multiplayer body chess — you are “climbing” an opponent who is also climbing you.
The sports are complementary and lapsing in attention in either of them usually leads to failure. When climbing a route, or rolling with a partner, you cannot afford to spend even a second of your brain’s processing power on something else, or you lose. Your body is 100% fully engaged all the time too.
When you are done with a roll or a climb, you are DONE. You left this world for 5 minutes, and nothing else existed. And then you reset and do it again. It is liberating on par with meditation.
It is extremely apolitical
It lacks everything I’ve grown to hate about the industry I had been actively participating in for close to 20 years now (IT, later blockchain), and it lacks the political polarization of the mass media and the wedge they continuously attempt to drive between people.
A pronoun obsessed social justice warrior can roll with a diehard anti-5G flatearther, and on the mat they are the same. A boulder has no political preference and it does not care that you are vegan, or that you want to carry guns to the climbing trip — it is there to be conquered.
Maybe all other non-team sports are similar, I have yet to find out, but I guess I was surprised by the fact that just a renewed glimpse of these people and these sports could create an emotion so strong it lingered for about 15 minutes, without me actually doing anything.
