My first rock climbing experience would be my last. Standing on the ground, looking towards the sky, watching the instructor skillfully navigate his way up the face of this majestic mountain, it seemed simple enough. But like life, being rooted to the ground where it’s safe, it’s so much easier to see the right way to go. When you’re living it two inches from your face, it’s hard to know what the right path to take is to reach the top.
Voices above me and below me yelling, some encouraging, some chastising as I clung for dear life, to a life that wasn’t very dear. “MOVE! you have to make a MOVE!” my instructor screamed down upon my head like a force of nature not to be dismissed. Fear stricken and paralyzed I yelled, “NO! Call in a helicopter, call in the army, get me off this rock! I’m NOT moving.”
The encouraging voices changed to angry demands and the chastising became cruel. The blood trickling down my arms, I had to move, but I had climbed a different path than my instructor. Who can tell when life sits so close to your face, that you’ve gone the wrong way? For me to move I was going to have to let go of both a hand and foot at the same time. I was going to have to make a leap to the right and grab hold of a place higher than where I was clinging to, challenging a gravitational pull determined to ground me.
Standing at the top afraid to let the air out of my lungs, I looked down to where I started. I repelled down with ease, holding on to the rope, looking down at the ground calling me to solid safety. This was the last time I looked up to see the possibilities above me. Possible became the problem. I wasn’t afraid of failing on the ground – I was afraid of falling from reaching for the sky.
From that moment on I kept my head down, worked hard at the opportunities right in front of me, opportunities rooted in reasonability and safety, never looking up at all that could be possible in my life.
Trauma and the Body have a unique relationship. In our mind we think the body is our slave. But when it meets trauma, a shift happens and if you’re not careful this new relationship can become the master of your mind and your life – dictating, limiting, even destroying your possible.
