Like all children, I had strong faith in my infinite ability to achieve anything; in fact I still do. I was 12 when I found out about skydiving and automatically I knew I had to do it. I knew this was as close as I’d get to be Peter Pan.
A couple of years later, I had my first chance to fly, but it was either:
Skydive or
Bungee Jump, learn how to snowboard and go on a helicopter ride in New Zealand. As the second option included more things I choose to go ahead with this.
As much as I wanted to skydive, every time I was presented with the opportunity I made excuses. “Not now, and It was always too expensive.” The truth is skydiving both fascinated and scared me. When thinking of it, images of floating down gracefully through the sky were intertwined with those of falling quickly towards earth.
This fear grew even more when a dear friend of mine lost her brother, a skydiving instructor, in a skydive went wrong. Although I knew one is more likely to die crossing the road than skydiving, this accident was always on my mind.
On a side note, I guess he was lucky to pass away while doing something he loved.
After years of consideration, I finally took the decision to skydive this year. 2012 was to be the year I become Peter Pan. Why now? Well, as my friends and those who follow my blog, know, I like constantly challenging myself. The months leading up to my plunge were somewhat tough. I graduated from my Masters program at I.E, and was going through the restlessness and frustrations that come with “what’s next?” I had a catch up with my dear friend Mai, who is living in Kiwi land, and she reminded me to go through my bucket list and find something that I could do to take me out of my funk.
The options were hot air balloon, skydive or make a wish and let a white dove fly away.
Following Steven Pressfield’s advice in his book The War of Art, “Do the thing that scares you the most”. I choose to jump 4,000 feet from a plane! It’s hard to explain what it really felt like, air rushing past you, earth rushing towards you and you thinking “I see what that whale in the Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy meant”.
Skydiving is one of those experiences where you have to do it to get. Explaining it will only provide you, the reader, with clichés about feeling liberated and alive. So instead of sharing what it felt like let me share what this entire experience taught me:
It’s healthy to have your reality shattered, it makes it more exciting to put the pieces back together. After skydiving you got a new perspective on life.
Do something that scares, the reward is amazing, that night I couldn’t sleep I was so high from the adrenaline rush
Dreams do come true, I did fly 🙂
Let me know if you would ever consider doing this?
