When struggling with a project or just having a bad day, we often ask ourselves why we do it. Why do I even climb? It’s kind of a silly sport -- you go up just to come right back down all while there’s usually a much easier way to the top. When bouldering we get just a few feet off the ground, yet we try so hard that we bleed. And some days climbing can make us feel miserable -- most of us have even declared that we've quit the sport, only to get back on the rock the next day. On both good and bad days, it's important to remind ourselves why we do it. So why do I climb? Here are my reasons.
T-Bone Shuffle (V4) in Hueco Tanks. Picture by Patrick Kua
Because it’s physical
Of course moving up small holds on rock is a very physical activity, but the beauty of climbing is that it’s not just one type of physical. It involves both strength and finesse.
Climbing isn’t weightlifting or even a pull up competition. While finger and hand strength plays a huge role, so do delicate movements and balance. The difference between sending your project and falling for the 20th time can be as simple as turning your hip an extra inch closer to the rock or using a foothold that’s a centimeter to the left of the one you used so many times before. It may be about finding and focusing on just the right muscle much like someone doing a pilates exercise. It may be about getting just a bit more weight over your right foot before making that move. Or it may be about forgetting all about the perfect movement and just pulling really hard.
I imagine the closest sport to climbing is gymnastics, which is also a marriage of strength and finesse. The difference is that our high bar, balance beam, and rings all exist in beautiful places in nature without ground rules, scores, or boundaries.
Because it’s mental
The strongest climbers will often argue that the sport is much more mental than it is physical. I think this claim is true for each of us when we’re climbing near our physical limits. To send a tough climb, you need to overcome a number of mental challenges.
First, you have to find just the right sequence for your hands and feet up the rock. Every climber knows that this is a puzzle that isn’t always easy to put together. Of course, we’re constructing this puzzle while dangling above our last protection with only a thin rope to save us when we fall.
I think that controlling the natural anxiety that occurs when we really really don’t want to fall is the toughest aspect of climbing. Sure, you can tell yourself that you’ve fallen before -- that you’re perfectly safe. But when you’re up there, your brain screams at you to stop. Everyone I’ve ever climbed with is impacted by it.
Then there’s dealing with the long-term mental impacts of a project. How do we get ourselves to keep trying a climb that we’ve failed on repeatedly? Sure, failing is part of learning and improving at anything. But failure in our lives hasn't been accompanied by a fall since we learned to walk and ride our bikes, and I think that the physical fall adds a level of discouragement. Imagine someone pushing you to the ground every time you mess up a math problem. Sounds terrible, right? Everywhere else in our adult lives we can quietly erase, ignore, or justify our failures. Not in climbing.
I believe that all of this has a positive impact on us in the real world. Climbing makes us mindful of the best sequence of tasks in our every day lives. Dealing with and climbing through anxiety teaches us how to behave calmly under all kinds of pressure. And a long-term project teaches us how to deal with, face head on, and correct our failures.
Because it connects us
There is a definite kinship felt between climbers. Climbing has introduced me to great people of all ages from all across the world. But climbing also makes me feel more connected to people of the past. I recently saw a picture of Boulder, CO in the 1800s. I was struck by the juxtaposition of the completely foreign buildings with exactly the same mountains that are there today. The mountains have looked this way for longer than we can imagine. So when we're fascinated by the rocks that we play on, we weren't the first to appreciate that beauty. For thousands of years people have looked upon these mountains with awe. All at once this concept makes me feel more alive, more human, and more connected with nature.
Because it’s personal
Most climbers have a friend that hates bouldering. And most climbers have a friend that hates trad climbing. Whether you're looking for a month long adventure in Patagonia, a weekend in Rocky Mountain National Park, a half day at the crag, or a quick session on some boulders, there's something for you.
But climbing is also a very personal sport because you're not playing against anyone. A 5.8 climber can belay a 5.14 climber, so we can feel free to climb with people at all different skill levels. All the while, it makes no sense to compare yourself to the stronger climber (unless it can motivate you) because the sport is all about improving your own skills.
Because God was a climber
Do you ever finish a climb and think to yourself, "how was that possible?" How was it that perfectly human sized holds get weathered into rock with human sized spacing in between? How was that undercling in exactly the right position to allow me to reach over the completely blank part of the rock to the little crimp that was just big enough for me to hold on to? It's those moments more than anything that keep me climbing. They make me feel like I chose the right sport. To put it in the words of my friend Sid, "God must have been a climber."