“It feels good to be up on a mountain…” - facing fear pt. 4

The Lap no. 32 - D-Day - 4 months

Feb 07, 2023

I spent last week skiing the Fee Glacier1 in the Swiss Alps with Dominique’s family. It was a chance to get some sun——above the clouds at 3573 meters (11,500 feet)——and enjoy some incredible meals and après ski banter with people I love and don’t get to see enough.

It was also a place to practice working with different flavors of fear, on water in its fresh and solid form, as an intermediate skier at best.

Ski season has been grim in Europe this year, with many areas completely bare. We had good conditions on the high glacier, but the lower slopes would be a waste of time. So, our plan was to take a series of lifts and a “Metro Alpin” train to the top of the glacier and spend our days on the high pistes of a “4000er.”

Watching the pines in the valley turn to matchsticks from the window of the gondola, I asked Dominique’s brother and sister, “there are some green (easy) slopes up top, right?”

Her brother replied, “This is Switzerland. We don’t pay attention to the colors.” (Read: unlike the French and Americans).

Exiting the “metro,” I could feel the altitude. A small sign in three languages warned of crevasses to the side of the piste. Another sign pointed out “alpine hazards,” meaning that every bad thing that could happen on a mountain awaited anyone who ventured off the groomed areas.

Nervous, dwarfed by the scale of everything around me, I tried to apply references I could understand: that’s a katabatic wind I’m feeling, blowing down from the ridge, like at the base of a sea cliff, force six? Maybe seven?

I watched Dominique’s dad drop over the lip of the first run, make his turn, and wait for me where the slope leveled off ahead of another steep section.

As I pointed my skis down the hill, I was scared of a dozen things at once:
What if I get hurt (and can’t do my trip around Ireland)?
What if I look like a kook in front of my in-laws?
They’re really good skiers. Her dad trained to fire bazookas on skis in the army…
All this while trying to remember where to put my weight and how to turn.

I had to find a way to tune out the noise and focus on my form. I needed a chill-out mantra.

Edging into my second turn, remembering how to ski, I thought of a line from Mountain of Storms, the 1968 ski, surf, and climbing film:

“It feels good to be up on a mountain…”

I smiled, stuck the turn, repeated the mantra, and took the lead on the next section.

A little while later, after an über steep run, Dominique’s brother hockey-stopped next to me and said,

“You were asking about colors… you just did a black one.”

“It feels good to be up on a mountain——the cold air in your lungs, the snow under your feet…”

-Mountain of Storms: A Legendary Roadtrip

The power and pitfalls of self-talk

Self-talk can be your best friend or your worst enemy on an adventure. Negative self-talk is almost never a good thing (except when assessing worst-case scenarios). But not all positive self-talk is truly helpful. Your affirmations have to be believable and convincing, not delusionally optimistic.

I can’t tell myself, “You’re a great skier,” because I know I’m not.

I can’t say, “You’re not going to break your leg.” Because I can’t promise that, and bringing it up just makes me think of breaking my leg.

Any statement that will capture my attention in a nervous state has to have depth and weight. My chill-out mantra has to be more compelling than the fear.

I find that the best self-talk is simple yet profound. On the surface level, it’s true that it “feels good to be up on a mountain.” But in a deeper sense, those words are a reminder that there are worse ways to spend a Tuesday than sliding down a glacier all morning with four talented skiers who are taking the time to teach me. I can use my fear of being ungrateful to cure my fear of falling.

In one of our coaching conversations, Mike gave me a similar mantra to lean on when conditions out on the water start to scare me. He said to remind myself:

“You wanted an adventure——now you’ve got one. This is exactly where you want to be.”

The Lap feat. on Steven Pressfield’s Writing Wednesdays

My friend and mentor Steven Pressfield had some powerful things to say about The Lap in last week’s Writing Wednesdays post.

I will be re-reading his words on D-Day and keeping them with me--on waterproof paper--as a source of strength when the rain is blowing sideways and I'm wondering what I'm doing out there.

Thank you, Steve!

“Our aim, like Charlie’s, is to return home a different person—battered a bit, and chastened perhaps, but wiser, and with a deeper understanding of ourselves and of life.”

-Steven Pressfield, “Creating our Own Wilderness”

Thank you, Team Fox donors

The fundraising for the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research is off to an epic start. Thank you for your generous donations:

Josh Maloney, Dan E, Amber Olson, Katherine Ballou, Daniel Donahue, Margot Wilson, Barbara Bieber, Colleen Kavanaugh, Christian Sallach, Peggy & Bob Crespo, Sinéad & Saul, Richard & Tamela.

Thanks for reading,

-Charlie

Thank you to Mike Jones for coaching and guidance.

Kokatat is the official gear sponsor of The Lap.