The Rock Warrior's Way: Mental Training For Climbers

appears who radically changes our concept of what is possible.
    In the 1960s, John Gill did boulder problems that were far beyond the normal difficulty of the day. Soon after he began climbing, Gill found that his inclinations differed from those of the mainstream climbers around him. He wasn’t interested in Himalayan peaks or Yosemite walls and didn’t feel they had any connection to what he enjoyed, which was climbing very difficult moves on small rocks. Gill took an activity that was considered practice, a mere sideshow to real roped climbing, applied his full focus to it, and declared it a worthy activity in itself.
    Reinhold Messner brought an entirely new outlook to climbing the world’s highest mountains. Himalayan climbing had become a complex exercise in logistics and tactics with ascents often requiring months. Messner, however, preferred the freedom of the climbing style used in his native Alps. To make the first “alpine-style” climb of an 8000-meter peak, Messner simply applied enough confidence and fitness to make his preferred climbing style work on a much larger scale. Messner quickly decided many mainstream climbing perceptions were not supported by satisfactory evidence. When Messner and his partner Peter Habeler announced their goal of climbing Everest without bottled oxygen, the “experts” declared the feat impossible, saying oxygen deprivation would cause severe brain damage. The pair demonstrated otherwise. Now, many mountaineers have climbed Everest without bottled oxygen.
    Gill and Messner raised world standards, but the important lesson is not how their feats compared to others. Their advancements came through radical, creative thinking, casting off the shackles of what they were being told. Each of us has such shackles which can be cast off. When we think in new ways, we foster creativity. What our old selves called impossible, our new selves may claim can be done. We see new options, potentials, and possibilities. Just as nothing standard-setting can be done with a mentality of “that’s the way it’s always been done,” so will we be held back by clinging to the mentality of “that’s the way I’ve always done it.” We may never set world bouldering standards or sprint up Himalayan giants, but we can experience our own revelations of what is possible if we are willing to think radically.
    Impossibility thinking is based on rigid opinions, and it’s focused on negative abilities. Possibility thinking is based on options and it’s focused on positive abilities. It’s important to see possibility within yourself, to believe you have the potential to meet big challenges. Your habits form imaginary walls, but outside these walls, there is room to believe. It’s easy to fall into impossibility thinking. Since it shrinks the world, such thinking can make us feel secure. Security should be our base camp, however, not the field in which we play out the adventure of our lives. Observe yourself, be alert for stale thinking, keep focusing on learning, and you’ll surprise yourself by what is possible.
    Think in possibilities, not just little possibilities but big ones. Give yourself room to believe. You’re more capable today than you were last year and will be more capable next year than you are today. Believe in that future potential. Be radical. A warrior is a leader, not a follower. Remember, however, it’s each person’s responsibility to take the appropriate amount of risk. Each individual must find that fine line between life and death, no-injury and injury. This will be a continual process. You push yourself further and further into possibilities and the unknown, and return with more personal power to risk again another day.

Chapter 5
    Choices
    In all endeavors there is a moment of truth. Preparation time is over but the action has not yet begun. The gun goes off for the sprint; the curtain comes up for the dance performance; the person you’ve been collecting the nerve to call picks up the phone and says, “Hello?” Your mindset in the following seconds has a huge impact on the course of events.
    Climbing is full of these moments, and the climber is particularly active in orchestrating them. A skier or kayaker is almost thrown into his challenges by the force of gravity, but the climber is offered a more extended period of choice. Climbing gives us more opportunity to either rush or procrastinate. Unlike a paddler in a surging river, the climber on a rock face