I can’t believe another week has gone by and that there is only 6 days to go!!
This week we have been working closely with Sarah, our expedition psychologist and I’ve been really taken back by how little I prepared psychologically for my previous expeditions. In the build up to our trips we spend considerable amounts of time training physically. We also spend a huge amount of time on the mandatory organisation and logistics, but until now we have never really put aside much time for to ‘officially’ prepare mentally. Under Sarah’s expert eye we have been working at dealing with some of our own fears and possibly more interestingly our ‘Dark Sides’. No this has nothing to do with Star Wars but rather the character traits that we poses that on a normal day would be our greatest assets but often under great pressure can become our worst enemies. On an expedition as difficult as this, where the odds are stacked against us, my mental preparation is the most important preparation of all, as I personally find so many elements of the journey incredibly daunting.
I have been working on visualising myself carrying out the various sections of the expedition successfully, as my head naturally thinks what if! What if the rope brakes? What if I forget something? Etc. So I have been trying to consciously concentrate on the idea that ‘you get what you focus on’ if you think your going to fall you are far more likely to,but equally, if you think you will reach the summit then you will. It sounds so obvious I know, but I suffer from an irrational fear of slipping on snow (I have never even fallen) and overcoming this is a real battle.
How we work as a team and make important decisions in crisis situations is obviously crucial. To help with this Sarah carried out 2 assessments that looked into the ‘bright’ side and ‘darker’ side of our personalities (kindly sponsored by Get Feedback). The results of which, has allowed us to work on tools and techniques to best manage ourselves and each other in what will be an extremely challenging environment, with the aim of making the most of our strengths and reducing the impact of our weaknesses. To see the results of Sarah’s summary from our personality assessments please click here.
A further dimension of physiological pressures to face us this week, has been the planning and logistics. Withso many elements of the expedition changing in the past fortnight, I reached a point where I just wanted to through in the towel (and we haven’t even started!) Taking out the packraft section felt like 3 months of prep had gone
to waste and that we were going to have to start over with little more than a week to go, it also resulted in more costs (charter fishing boats to take us to the start etc) and the funds have well and truly run out! Sponsorship falling through due to timeframe, and the video camera braking amongst many other little things, just tipped me over the edge and I had had enough.
24 hours later I was back on track with a new plan, and had managed to put it all into perspective… The packraft was always a fun element not an essential one, the change of kit and tweaking bits and pieces down to the last second is completely normal for expeditions, and as for the sponsorship… well its defiantly not the first time and I can bet it wont be the last either.
However, the week has finished on a high. We had a great rope work session in Avon Gorge on Saturday going through routines, and on Sunday I woke and for the very first time since the expedition idea came about, truly believing I could do it. I always was ready to give it my best shot, but knowing only to well that what we are attempting, with a light and fast approach, will be boarder line possible, I hadn’t 100% believed in my ability. But I do have the skills, and I now believe that if the weather isn’t against us too much we can achieve this.
