As I continued to push myself in the world of whitewater kayaking, the reality of being the only female paddler in my country began to sink in. In a sport dominated by men, I stood out like a sore thumb, a lone figure amid a sea of masculinity. While my passion for kayaking fueled my journey, the emotional weight of being the odd one out was heavy on my shoulders.

In a male-dominated environment, unwanted attention became a constant companion. What started as innocent camaraderie with my male counterparts, who once called me their sister, soon changed. The dynamic shifted to where they viewed me through a different lens. The challenges extended beyond the riverbanks, infiltrating the sanctity of my personal space. Drunken men would bang on my door at night, leaving me feeling anxious and exposed. Yet, in my naiveté, I never shared these struggles with anyone, fearing I would be held responsible for the unwanted attention.

The thought of burdening my parents with these hardships was unbearable. I couldn’t consider the idea of being forced to give up kayaking, the very thing that brought me solace amid the chaos. So I kept silent, shouldering the weight of my struggles alone.

What broke my heart the most was the absence of anyone to stand up for me in these moments of vulnerability that continue to this day. The kayaking community, for all its camaraderie on the river, felt like a lonely place when faced with the harsh realities of being a female paddler. It was this void, this sense of isolation, that drove me to seek out a river family of my own.

Climbing has been instrumental in helping me recognize the significance of freedom in my life. It stands as one of my most cherished assets. I’m thankful for the ability to pursue all that I do. Above all, the freedom to travel without anyone dictating where I can or cannot go is invaluable. However, I do find myself grappling with decision making at times, especially when faced with numerous enticing opportunities from various directions. During the first wave of the COVID pandemic, I began traveling more frequently. My friend and I borrowed a car from my parents and we spent nearly three months in Spain during the winter. We primarily camped outdoors, either in a tent or under the open sky. We rarely encountered other people and we took all necessary precautions to prevent the spread of the disease. While I climbed daily and attended online classes in the mornings and evenings, my friends in the Czech Republic were restricted to their homes. This situation struck me as truly unfortunate. It was then I realized the profound value I place on freedom and the opportunity to be outdoors.

Since then, my wanderlust hasn’t waned. Whenever I embark on a journey, I aim to prolong my stay as much as possible. Being a student with sporadic work as a climbing instructor, my budget is not limitless. Travel itself always constitutes the most significant expense. However, by cutting costs at the destination, the overall trip often turns out to be more economical than regular living expenses. I encounter many people who think this couldn’t be true. Over time, I opted to create a sleeping setup in my car. With the help of my dad, I converted my Hyundai Getz into a makeshift camper. Though compact, equipped with a rooftop box, it comfortably accommodates two people. Once it was done, my boyfriend, Ondra, and I set off for Chamonix for a month for the first time. Since then, we’ve adopted this mode of travel, striving to maximize the number of people we can accommodate.

I was pleasantly surprised by how simple everything became while traveling. Online learning was a perfect fit for me, allowing me to be anywhere and manage my time efficiently. Although I initially studied food analysis, I realized it wasn’t the best career choice for me. Instead, I seized the opportunity to pursue a master’s degree in data engineering. I’m committed to maximizing my flexibility to work from anywhere in the future. I find great joy in continually learning new and fascinating subjects.

For the most part, I don’t think being in my 60s is a problem physically. I take good care of myself. I exercise, eat well, get adequate sleep, and don’t do things that might compromise my health. Whereas many people my age are losing their balance, getting out of shape, and suffering from various illnesses, including depression, thankfully, I am healthy and strong, and my balance is improving. Indeed, slacklining is a fountain of youth. When I am in the backyard slacking, listening to music, I am happy and ageless. I am in flow, feeling great, and loving life. However, I know the processes of aging are relentless, and that, someday, if I don’t die first, I will begin losing my strength and abilities. I try to accept this inevitability while remembering to savor every day of health and every day of slacking. I have had some injuries from slacklining, including a broken collarbone that required surgery and a titanium plate. But I have recovered from the injuries. Fortunately, I have gifted physical therapists that have helped me recover from a series of minor but potentially debilitating aches and pains. My PTs teach me exercises and stretches to deal with the parade of issues I bring to their doors, and my morning exercise routine gets progressively longer as I add each of their prescribed exercises to it.

There are ways my mind sabotages my goals by the way it interprets physical pain. For example, for over a year I’ve been dealing with some pain in my right groin area. This injury first arose when I did more than 30 leash climbs and line mounts in one highline session – an overuse injury likely. But it has been very slow to heal, probably because I keep using it. A while ago, I began interpreting my groin pain as old age creeping in, maybe arthritis. That idea depressed me and made me feel weak, which compromised how I performed on the line.

My performance coach, Dr. Xuemei Zhong, however, observed that we inherit socially constructed preconceptions about aging as necessarily entailing decline, and these narratives are all too quick to pop into our head to account for any kind of pain as part of the norm of aging. Xuemei told me such beliefs and imaging are disempowering and prevent us from seeing and experiencing the alternative norm that we can stay strong and pain-free until we die. She also taught me that my body is super intelligent and wants me to achieve my dreams. Sometimes physical discomfort can be a message for course correction or a reminder to pay attention to something I would otherwise ignore. I had been in a pattern of repeated aborted sit starts, where I’d get into sit start position, lift my body a little bit, and then collapse back down, essentially giving up. Each aborted sit start irritates my groin, and Xuemei invited me to explore what might be the message of my pain. One of the messages we brainstormed was that maybe the pain is teaching me to quit aborting and to fully commit to each sit start. I did not know if it was true or not, but I felt relieved. The new idea that pain had something to teach me that could improve my slacklining felt empowering rather than disempowering. And soon my pain was actually gone, as I was busy paying attention to my Perú trip and other activities. However, whenever I feel fear about not achieving my goal or have doubts about my body and aging, the pain comes back to remind me.

Through this experience, I learned our repeated thoughts, imaging, and narratives of aging and our body make a crucial difference in our performance and healing. Our thoughts lead to emotions, and emotions affect our biology and lead to different performance outcomes. If you want to improve your performance, you must improve your thought process and replace disempowering beliefs with empowering beliefs. Improved thinking also speeds up recovery and healing.