In reply to Jack Geldard - Editor - UKC:
Looking at her website I thought the following was intersting:
What is mindfulness?
Mindfulness is both an old and a new concept, drawn from eastern philosophies of being in the moment, and now widely used to help people manage anxiety and improve their self development. It is closely allied with meditation, but rather than a sitting, still meditation, mindfulness can be practised anytime, anywhere, simply by becoming more present in the here and now. It is the focus on the here and now, rather than the past or future, which can be extremely beneficial for climbing.
Sounds easy in theory, but mindfulness requires practice, as our brains often run away with us, filling up with unhelpful self talk and judgments. When climbing, this may take the form of ruminating about what might happen eg “I’m going to fall, I’m going to fall” or what may have happened in the past eg “oh god, last time I had a complete wobbly”, to even making judgments about our own internal state eg “why am I always so scared, why cant I keep it together”. Mindful climbing allows us to observe those thoughts and let them pass, gently returning our attention to the here and now and back into our bodies eg “what can I feel right now, how is my body positioned, where are the areas of over tension”. This more helpful, focused attention on the here and now allows us to climb more efficiently and dissipate anxiety.
Mindfulness in climbing does not require us to fight our fear, as that will take valuable energy away from the goal at hand. Rather it allows us to be anxious, to acknowledge it is a valid feeling in the moment, and then to return to the physical here and now. A mindful approach to climbing may also involve you questioning your underlying motivations for climbing. For example, why are you climbing? Is it to improve (and why, for who?) or is it for the aesthetic, the atmosphere, being outdoors and so on. Cultivating a mindful approach requires more focus on the journey than the end point, which can feel counter intuitive in our goal-orientated society, but for climbing can actually be more productive in that it can create the conditions for the flow experience through improved technique and attention.