Big toes and breathing

Have done quite a lot of coaching recently in North Wales and one of the common themes has been around the importance of keeping your mind in your big toe!  Now before you think I have gone completely mad, the most common reason for most people to fall off is their feet slipping off, rather than their hands failing them - and this is usually the exact opposite to what people imagine happens. Many people talk about needing to get stronger, better finger strength and so on, and yet most often its their feet that let them down - literally!

Foot position is crucial and yet because the area in our brain (the sensory cortex) is larger where it is associated with our hands than our feet, and possibly because our hands are more often in their eye-line, its harder to keep our feet in mind.  Consequently, not enough pressure is placed on the big toes which anchor us to the holds, or perhaps the pressure is unevenly placed and then we become out of balance.

A simple yet hard to do exercise to correct this involves breathing into your feet.  Before you step onto the route, wiggle your toes in your shoes and try to develop a sense of them inside your boot.  As you breathe out, imagine the breath travelling down your legs and into your big toes.  This can be done when you are sitting at your desk, anywhere really, but regular practice is a must.  Then transfer this to when you are on the rock, trying to maintain that sense all your body as a whole and in particular your 'lower corners' (if the hands are your upper corners, your feet are the lower corners).  Really focus on what you can feel beneath your toes, are they equally weighted, is your foot horizonal, are you using the big toe as a lever to keep your feet on (particularly if its overhanging). 

Give it a go!

Its great to get feedback

Constructive feedback is always helpful yet often we are defensive, feeling insecure or that the feedback somehow reflects on us as a person or means that we are not as well liked as we hoped.   Often we think we are giving ourselves feedback when in fact what we are doing is criticising ourselves, beating ourselves up about things we "should" do better.  It can be hard to objectively analyse our performance and see the strengths as well as our growing edges.  An over-emphasis on problems can lead to perpetuation of those problems, whereas a focus on strengths and solutions is usually much more helpful.  Our poor brains dont understand "dont do/think about x"; instead what they hear is just "x".  As climbers tend to be very achievement orientated, this tendency is often quite pronounced, and it can take a huge effort to learn to be kind to ourselves.

A few days ago I was delighted to receive some positive feedback so I am going to share it with you now!  A guy emailed me and said;

"Just to let you know that although I haven't been to see you you've already helped me. I read your blog regularly and 2 weekends ago went with my pal to North Wales, we did some easy multi pitch stuff on little tryf and the next day did Cneifon Arete. I overcame some of my fears by not letting the "chatter" as you called it interfere, I'm not there yet but I just want to thank you for being instrumental in helping me. I still want to attend one of your weekend courses when I get some money together as I think they'll help me immensely"

Brilliant!!  

quick update

Have been on my holidays for the last couple of weeks, and as its showery today I find myself inexplicably drawn to the computer!

A few things have occurred to me during my travels in Northern Scotland and now Northumberland. I have had chance for some serious downtime, and given the space to think, I have been able to re-evaluate some of my goals. Its easy to get committed to certain courses of action, training programs or goals, and then follow them blindly even when our desires or needs change, or when they are no longer useful.

One of the key exercises I use with people is to have them imagine what they would like said about them in their obituary/ written on their headstone. Morbid perhaps! But a useful way of thinking about your priorities in life and then aligning your goals with your values. Then its important to think, will this action move me closer to my values and goals. Often when we really examine them, our goals can be quite arbitrary or their importance seems diminished when we place them under the spotlight.

So, my values and goals have become a little adrift over the last 12 months, but these last couple of weeks have allowed me to refocus, and set new goals which are closer to my values. I hope you can take time out to do the same - whether about your life in general, or about your climbing.