How much of a daredevil are you?

I’m not a daredevil and I never have been. I have always tried to stay away from danger when at all possible.

Let’s look at some examples. My friends have described skiing as the best feeling in the world, but I am reluctant to try it because I am afraid that I might sprain my knee or dislocate my shoulder. The stories that I’ve heard about failed parachutes are enough to make me never want to try skydiving. Scuba diving doesn't sound fun at all, especially if there are sharks swimming nearby. The prospect of being shot at, even in a friendly and playful environment, terrifies me, so I don't think I'm going to ever play paintball. I will never crave the adrenaline rush that you get from riding roller coasters or understand why you would go into a haunted house unless you were forced to.

This high level of caution has been a characteristic of my personality for as long as I can remember. There have been very few instances when I chose to do something that I thought might be dangerous. However, there was one time when I decided to try something that I never thought I would. In 2012, I was at a workshop at a health institute called Omega in Rhineback, NY, where I tried a trapeze for the first time. I walked past the trapeze every day, and I couldn’t stop looking at it and wondering what it was. I asked around and found out that it was a trapeze. Something about it made me want to try it, so I decided to go for it. The next day, I was signed up for a lesson.

As I walked towards the trapeze that day, it got taller and bigger and scarier with every step, and I started to seriously rethink my decision. When it was my turn to go, I slowly made my way up the ladder, stepped onto the tiny elevated platform, and grabbed the bar. I received instructions to jump off of the platform, tuck my knees in, do a backflip and fall into the net below. I stood at the edge of the platform waiting for my queue to jump. What had I gotten myself into?

I refused to do it. I tried to work up the courage, but it never came. I decided the safest thing to do was to gently step off of the platform, swing until the bar stopped moving, and then carefully let go of the bar and fall into the net. The instructor, unhappy that I chickened out, pushed me to try it again. I climbed back up the ladder and stood on the tiny platform for the second time. I don’t remember what the maneuver felt like; I think I blacked out as soon as my feet left the platform. What I do remember was standing on the platform before I jumped, looking down at the grass that was so far below me, thinking about all of the things that could go wrong and wondering, “Why am I doing this?”

I survived though! In reality, the trapeze wasn’t the most dangerous thing in the world. It wasn’t even close. There are a lot of things I do every day that are probably more dangerous, like driving a car or looking at my phone while I’m walking down stairs. I’m not sure why I become so paralyzed with fear in these situations. I start to imagine all of the bad things that could happen, like the trapeze might fall to pieces as soon as I jumped off the platform, or the net might suddenly disappear, but those things weren’t going to happen. On the contrary, a lot of things could happen when I’m doing something more normal like driving my car. But I don’t think about all of those things when I get behind the wheel. If I did, I would be too afraid to even turn the key.

So maybe the difference between those two situations is that one is familiar and the other is not. I would like to challenge myself to face unfamiliar situations more. They wouldn’t be as unknown and scary if I did. In that way, I aspire to be more like a daredevil. That isn’t to say, though, that I will ever be one.