How the World’s Best Free Climber Deals With Fear
Prepare, prepare, and prepare some more.
I have to admit something: I’ve never been terrified. The closest I’ve come was jumping from a 20-foot pole on a school trip when I was 12. It’s a privilege I have only just come to realize, and it got me thinking.
What does genuine fear look like, and how do you deal with it? Now, when someone says the word “fear”, what comes to mind? For many people, it’s heights.
When up high, your eyes cannot focus on anything in front of you, as it is too far away, which then causes dizziness, hence the phrase “dizzying heights.” It is an actual test of fear.
You’d think, therefore, that the world’s best free climber isn’t afraid of anything. Well, Alex Honnold disagrees. Star of the Oscar-winning Free Solo and the first human to climb El Capitan in Yosemite National Park (twice as tall as the Empire State Building), Alex has learned how to handle his fear.
“The crucial question is not how to climb without fear, but how to deal with it when it creeps into your nerve endings.”
Let’s see how he deals with it, and how you can too.
