In a few minutes I will be heading out for a Treetop Adventure; climbing ladders, walking on tightropes, and ultimately, soaring down a zip line. I’m going because a friend of mine told me that she was afraid of heights, and I saw it as an opportunity to help her get past that. 

Let’s do it!  It’ll be great!  I said to her, forgetting for the moment that I too was afraid of heights.   Perhaps I was hoping that she would say no? But she didn’t say no.  So within the hour I will be climbing up higher than I have ever climbed.

But it’s no big deal, right? Right? Just a new adventure.  If we live life with a beginner’s mind, every single thing we do is a new adventure, every moment, every breath. 

Every time I step on my yoga mat it is a new adventure.   I am a different person.  Some days I can bust out a wheel, or balance beautifully in half moon, and some days I can’t even forward fold without a struggle.  I can’t expect last year’s, or even yesterday’s body to do today’s practice.  

So today, I will embark on yet another adventure  with a beginner’s mind.    I have never stood on this exact ladder, in this exact tree.  This is new, and so am I.   I can’t project my past fears onto this new adventure. Just because I have been afraid of heights before does not mean that I will be afraid of these heights, on this day.

To say I AM afraid of heights, makes it so.  And it doesn’t have to be so.  It doesn’t have to be so today.