"READY ON 1, 2, 3, and 4. Release"l

For my entire life I have been afraid of heights.  My husband once took me to a place called Haliburton Highlands to look at a cottage.  After 2 hours on the road, the last 35 minutes having been spent on winding roads sometimes 3 stories up, he pulled into the cottage he wanted to show me.  I stepped out of the car and looked down.  The cottage was on a steep hill, 1 story down.  The property sloped down another 2 stories.  I looked him straight in the eye and said, "Do you have any fucking idea who you apparently love?"  And got back into the car to catch my breath.  

I don't like heights.

It used to be so bad that standing on a chair would actually give me butterflies.  I've advanced to ladders now.  God help us all if that ladder shifts at all unexpectedly as I will wet myself, then freeze and cry until the firemen come to get me.  

I don't like heights.

For 46 years heights have put a little panic in my step.  I have pushed through them to partake in air travel, even a helicopter once and a small private plane.  I took valium for each.  Perhaps with an ativan chaser good measure.  I have skied in the mountains but making sure only to chose the hills that are actual slopes and could not be defined as drops in any way, the ski instructor was empathically told.  I have driven over bridges high enough to allow cargo ships under them all while white knuckling the steering wheel, staying in the middle lane, looking only at the car ahead of me, and I might have held my breath every single time.  Thank jesus there was never a traffic jam on one *passes out*.  That has never happened other than in my wildest nightmares.

I have a mental illness called Borderline Personality Disorder.  Wikipedia describes the disease as also being known as
emotionally unstable personality disorder, is a long term pattern of abnormal behaviour characterized by unstable relationships with other people, unstable sense of self, and unstable emotions.  


Now I would like you to think of this irrational fear of heights and put the feelings I might experience into the perspective of thinking as outlined above and now imagine the impact.

Today I strapped myself into what basically amounted to a lifejacket harness, and let someone push me out into the sky from four stories (50 feet up) up.  I travelled through the air for a minute on nothing but a steel rope, for a distance of 2,200 feet.

I am not actually in this picture.  I took this from the fetal position. 

The people in yellow are all employees, and basically teenagers.  A, summer job could have been newspaper delivery, teenager had my life in her hands.  

See the little lines in the upper right corner, yeah that's the string they threw me out on!

I cannot begin to tell you how amazing it felt to overcome this irrational fear and just enjoy the moment. Today was, without a doubt, one of the best days of my life.   

I highly recommend it.  Not just zip lining, but staying right here in the now.  It's much less scary.  

I know you're thinking, "I am more scared of heights than you must be, there is no way".

All I did was talk to myself the entire time I was walking up the 4 stories, waiting in line, trying on the gear, suiting up and waiting for the gate to open.  I told myself repeatedly, "stay here, enjoy this, stay here, enjoy this, stay here, enjoy this".  I looked only off into the distance and not down, not back, just forward.  

And I jumped.