The Fear of Falling

The Fear of Falling, yes falling, not failing.

Happy Self-Love Sunday beautiful human.

Real quick, these are the words of affirmation you deserve for this upcoming week:

1. You will overcome it

2. You are deserving of light

3. You are stronger than you know.

4. It will not always be this way.

5. & If everything is amazing, remind yourself that you deserve each and every second of it

Okay, now let’s get into today’s topic…

The Fear of Falling

Last Tuesday I went rock climbing with a good friend of mine for the first time in years. I was excited for many reasons and extremely appreciative of an opportunity to get out of the house. The climbing gym that we went to had auto-belay courses that were available to all climbers 12 years and older (so that would be me). All the previous times I’ve rockclimbed there has been something on the other side of the wall, a platform to climb onto, a rope to slide down, or a partner holding me up with the ability to let me down slowly. I had never rock climbed using an auto-belay, headrushtech.com defines it as “a device that takes up the slack as a climber ascends the climbing wall. When the climber reaches the top, or if they fall, the auto belay catches the climber and slowly lowers them to the ground”. Even that definition sounds terrifying, I had to trust that this device would hold me up, keep me safe and ensure that I wouldn’t fall to my death.

I’ve never been afraid of heights but I’ve always grappled with this intense fear of falling. I don’t like feeling out of control or not knowing what awaits me at the bottom.

Before reaching the top of one of the rock climbing courses, it hadn’t crossed my mind that I would have to sit back, push my feet out towards the wall and allow myself to fall. All the excitement of achieving a huge feat and reaching the top of the course drifted away as I found myself fighting an intense fear of falling.

I wasn’t in a situation where falling was an option, falling was THE only option and that scared me immensely. Thoughts flooded my mind as I tried to think of a way out. I smiled down at my friend cheering me on as I did all I could to control my breathing and calm myself down.

I did not fear failing or not making it to the top, those were things I knew I could do. But I was intensely afraid of placing all of my trust in this thing that was supposed to safely guide me back to the ground.

This morning I woke up with the revelation that maybe sometimes we don’t fear what is in front of us, we might not even fear failing at the task at hand. No, we have this hidden fear of falling. Falling back into old habits, falling in love or doing anything that requires us to relinquish full control. Climbing the wall was hard but reaching the top and intentionally making the decision to let go was way harder.

The beauty in it is all is that, the first step, simply letting go, was the most difficult. Yes, my first descent down was a little ugly. It was obvious that I was still trying to have as much control as I possibly could as I swung my feet wildly preparing for them to hit the ground. But after the 3rd and 4th time, letting go felt like second nature.

There are moments in life when it’s best to simply let go and allow the chips to fall where they may. I can not control everything and that scares me but I’m learning to live with that realization. I’m trusting that the God I serve and the universe I align myself with will catch me WHEN (not if) I do fall.