Despite the fact that my partner is totally obsessed with snowboarding, AND it’s the social event of the year with my big group of friends, it was something that I’d been reluctant to do for a while.
However, after a few years, I’d finally had enough of my partner going on holiday without me and the ensuing Facebook pictures of all my friends relaxing with Prosecco in the hot tub after a hard days boarding. I knew I had to get in on the action. I’d finally decided to learn to snowboard.
There was just one problem. I was scared senseless of the slopes! I’d had a bad experience a few year previously on a skiing holiday, where I’d let anxiety and fear get the better of me.
Back then, the ski lifts looked like mechanical contraptions of death while I felt certain that I, unwieldy in my skis, would slip off the edge of the mountain and end up mangled in a frosty grave.
I’d spent a good portion of the holiday in tears, sliding down on my bum, vowing never to return to the slopes again.
However, since those days, I’ve done a lot to overcome my anxiety and I felt determined to overcome this fear and join in on the fun.
During that week in the French alps I couldn’t help but draw similarities between learning to snowboard, and life (that are especially relevant to the anxious amongst us.)
If ask most people what learning to snowboard is like and they’ll often sigh and tell you that the first FEW holidays are spent mainly on your arse.
Learning to snowboard involves heaving yourself up a hill and then precariously sliding down, interjected with several demoralising and often painful falls. After you’ve fallen over and pulled yourself up for the 200th time that day, you’re basically exhausted and ready for some serious apres ski.
At the start of my fear-busting holiday, I was calm and confident on the baby slopes, feeling unjustifiably smug as I whizzed past the three year old French children who joined me on the easy slope. But the smugness wasn’t to last.
By day four, our group had to move on to the ‘big girl’ slopes, the ‘blue’ runs. The most used phrase by our instructor, Pierre, was to ‘lean in!’.
As I faced down the icy, slippery hill, every cell in my body screamed out ‘lean BACK, for goodness sake!’. It felt totally counter intuitive to want to lean down a hill; like you could fall on your face, or worse, increase your speed! I felt the old anxious thoughts and feelings start to overcome me.
The thing about snowboarding is that when we ‘lean in’ down the slope, it gives us more control over the board and it’s actually an essential part of going anywhere, since otherwise you pretty much stay stationary, or you lose your balance and fall over.
A key thing I’ve learned from my work with people with anxiety is that we often have a problem ‘leaning in’ to our lives, and our fears.
The fear holds us back and keeps us stationary. Whether it’s about taking risks, putting ourselves out there or speaking up, ‘leaning in’ is often too fearful a prospect. We don’t like the uncertainty and the feeling of risk.
However, when we do overcome the discomfort and ‘lean in’ to our lives, we quickly learn that we can handle whatever the outcome is, and in my case, that even if we do fall over, it’s never so bad as our minds make it out to be. We can get back up and try again.
When we do lean in to life, we’re more in control of our lives and we increase our happiness and confidence while we’re at it.
It felt amazing to finally be able to make it down the blue slope, without tears (or sliding down on my bum) and following that holiday, I felt ready to take on the world.
So snowboarding is a lot like life. Even if things don’t go exactly as you’d like, you can always pull yourself up again and try it again, probably having learned a hell of a lot in the process.
By leaning in, you regain control, and you’re always moving forwards. @CBrotheridge
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I’d love to hear about how you could ‘lean in’ more to your life. What could you say ‘yes’ to that you’d been too scared to try in the past? How can you start to put yourself out there more? What small step can you take to face a fear and move forward? Let us know in the comments!
Chloe Brotheridge is an anxiety expert and calm coach. Get a FREE relaxation MP3 when you visit www.calmer-you.com. For 121 sessions in London see www.easywaytochange.co.uk You can find her on Twitter, FB and IG.
Image courtesy of Stella Caraman.
