From Couch to Rock Wall: A Two Year Reflection

This past week, I celebrated my climbing birthday. Or in other words, it’s been exactly one year since I took up rock climbing as my new hobby. Naturally, I started thinking back to where I was a year before that. The answer? On my couch.

And I don’t mean that in the lazy sense or in the way people talk about going from the couch to a marathon. Two years ago, I was only a few days away from the court date that would legally end my marriage, hardly a year after it started. I was paralyzed with fear, not only from the recent trauma that had ensued, but also with fear for what lay ahead. I was deep in grief and questioned what I did to deserve so much pain. 

I wrote in my journal how proud I was for getting myself to eat half a can of soup, for vacuuming the living room rug, and for cleaning up the dried cat puke that had been on the couch for five days already. I was depressed, heartbroken, and sick from not being able to stomach any food. “All I have wanted to do all day is sleep, even after two naps,” I wrote.

I remember being in that space. Feeling alone and like I wasn’t enough. Enough to have a marriage where I was treated well. Enough for my husband to want to get sober. Enough to save him. Enough to save myself.

I see her, and I want to wrap her in a hug. Tell her she was always enough. Tell her that things will get better. Tell her that one day her pride will come not from making it through the day but from doing things she never thought she’d be brave enough to do. That one day, soon, she’ll drive her car away into the unknown to find new adventure. That she’ll find bravery being in the wilderness all alone. That she’ll hike up mountains and swim in alpine lakes. She will learn to climb cliffsides and rappel off of them. She’ll learn to trust others again, even with her life, even when she falls, quite literally, from great heights.

She’ll see so many beautiful places. She’ll make friends with strangers all over the country. She’ll come eye to eye with a bobcat and not run. She’ll be stranded ten miles in the desert on a road the tow company won’t come to, and she’ll figure out how to get out on her own. She’ll get stuck on a knot in a rope on a rappel 200 feet from the ground and not panic. Learn how to lead climb and carry the rope up a wall with her after only a month of climbing. Climb a multi-pitch shortly after. She will backpack 24 miles through the mountain tops in only 24 hours and later summit the tallest peak in the range, boldly on her own. She’ll move to a new state. Invest in herself so that she can start helping others. She’ll give it her all to build a program that will help other women face their fears, too.

But oh, even with all the bravery she’ll find, even after all the ways she’ll face her fears, I’ll tell her the greatest gift, my dear, is that you’ll find that you were always enough. That all of the journey was a journey back to the self.

That there’s no such thing as being enough for someone else because they are on their own journey. But you are always, always enough to save yourself.

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Want to learn how my yoga journey lead me back to myself and discover key shifts you can start using to find your own bravery? Get access to my no-cost masterclass “How To Use Yoga to Find Your Bravery” by clicking here.