Holding on

*Hold on*

*to what is good.*

*(Romans 12:9)*

We talk a lot about letting go. Many people have written many things about it, and probably I will too. But this is a post about holding on.

When I was little I climbed everything. Trees, door frames, fireman’s poles, to the top of the tallest climbing frames and along the outside of bridge railings. When we passed rocky outcrops on car journeys, I’d ask if we could stop, so I could climb.

And this longing to climb has never left me, but for a whole lot of reasons, I didn’t have opportunity to pursue it until recently (the odd tree excepted). But nowadays, aching muscles, tying in, my no-longer-new shoes, chalk on my clothes, under my nails, in my hair, are becoming satisfyingly familiar. And are still a miracle.

And so, I’ve been learning about holding on.

A little note if you’re not a climber yourself - its actually not all about your arms. Climbing. Or this post. People often assume that super strong arms are needed, but it’s actually mostly about legs. And the biggest muscle in the body. Hello glutes. Hello all the other ways you can hold on, and how you can be held.

But you do start out that way. Making everything about reaching and pulling and end-gaming and always looking ahead and missing where you are and what’s under your hands and feet and who’s bearing your weight. You start off hanging on for dear life, arms bent like a T-Rex and sapping all your strength, holding on too tight, and trying to lift yourself in a way you probably weren’t made to do.

How you hold on with your hands, depends on what you’re holding. Learning to fit your fingers to the shape of what’s beneath them. The texture. Discovering how you can grip something smooth, something sharp, something rough, something small, something that isn’t what you though it would be before you touched it.

Pinching, pressing, pulling, crimping, bracing, balancing - your whole hand or just your fingertips, your toe or your heel or your back - shifting your weight, holding on to where you need to be - then ready to hold on to where you need to go.

Learning how what you’re holding onto, with hands or toes or fingertips or confidence or desperation, shapes how you move. And how you move shapes how you hold on. How you give your weight. How you turn yourself in another direction to find you can reach a little further than you thought. Being present to what you’re holding onto, until you find out how it is leading you wherever is next.

Touch. Being present. Being brave. Relationship with each thing you hold. Being there, where you are. Holding the idea of where you’ll be next. And the next way to hold. The risk in moving. The strain of staying still. The trust, because someone is holding a rope, that is holding you.

At first, you climb on a rope attached to the top of the wall. Someone takes it in, and physics and technique and clever devices mean that if you fall, it won’t be far, and if ever you can’t hold on any more, someone will lower you down. And you can try holding on in a different way, or choose to try holding on somewhere else entirely. Or maybe you’re the one holding the rope, running it through your hand, holding it and holding someone - which you find you can.

It’s a tiny miracle each time. That you are holding the end of a rope with another human being on the end of it, and the way the world and climbing gear is made means they don’t feel too heavy, and they don’t fall too far. You hold them on the rope, and in your encouragement when they aren’t sure what to hold next, and then they will hold you the same.

And if that’s you, up the wall, tied on, then you know that between all these things, you are held. And you learn to trust that you’re not too much, even when you fall. In fact, sometimes, as you’re trying to find the right way forward, you can just rest, held.

And who could have known that being that home educated kid who learnt all about tying different kinds of knots, from books on boats and ancient celtic symbols and 90’s friendship bracelets and tents and making bows and arrows and setting up swings, who would have thought that would hold you now. What you learnt about movement as an actor is held in your body somewhere, ready for this.

That loving to watch, to listen, to cheer people on, hold them if they need it, hold ideas and learn new things, with your hands and your body and your heart, would be what is needed here. What you hold within you ready for all this holding, now.

Holding one another. Holding shifting rope. Holding your gear ready to use, reminding you of what you know now that you didn’t know before. Holding chalk on your fingertips and spreading it over your hands and into the air and letting your eyes trace where you’ll start to hold on. And where next. And next. Holding pieces of plastic screwed to a wall and somehow finding life, there, in your hands. Holding and moving your weight through your feet and using the strongest parts of you there are and the forces you live within - all these holdings on carrying you.

Later, you learn to lead belay. Holding the rope with more fluidity, and sensitivity, and the first few times, slight panic. Far more responsibility. Learning how to measure each moment of holding, each inch of rope. Feeling in your fingers what the holding is that is needed now. Holding someone’s life in your hands, and perhaps their new rope too, and understanding how to hold all these precious things. Finding that you are trusted, to hold others, to catch their falls. Understanding that what you need is to be ready to hold, when someone needs to be safe. Trust, that you will hold on, no matter what. And lots of skilful holding as they climb - just as they’ll hold you.

And enjoying this holding. And the holds you see them find, as they go. And being ready and fully attentive and present to the rope and the climber and your body and the ground beneath your feet and joy.

More things. How satisfying it is to hold onto a piece of gear, and feel its weight and wire and where it fits. Smooth metal, different thicknesses of rope, carabiners that fill your hand, heavy coils on your shoulders, and your head held in a helmet that was just what you needed at a brilliant bargain, and all these hold you differently, and feel different as you hold them. Carrying what you need. Holding it all on your body, hands and feet free to clamber over moss and overgrown paths and wide stones and chalky tracks to rock that you will climb. And to find the way back down, having held on.

Being indoors and learning and holding onto different brightly coloured pieces of plastic, and even sometimes autobelays (maybe) are good. But what I was holding onto, from the first climb, from the days of trees and railings and rope swings, was being outdoors.

Climbing, for me, was wanting to be holding onto a real rock, somewhere out in wild. Held by rock with as much life as me and finding a way to hold on.

And one day, you’ve held on, and practised holding on, enough to be there. Perching on broken rock to put your shoes on amongst scrubby bushes and sunshine. Face to face with the real, ancient, ever changing, trustworthy, strange, beautiful, benevolent rock you have longed to hold. And all you can do is begin. Let your fingers and feet and hands and hope find ways to climb. Fully hold what is there.

The rock under your fingertips. The landscape in handspan of gritstone. The rock that has held on through millennia and holds you now, stretching up with no plastic planning, just clues and crevices and lichen and polish and millions of stories spreading over its surface. Holding your story as you climb. Rock that holds you, but also must be held, moment by moment, risk by risk, scraped knuckle by grazed knee, strong ledge by barely balanced toehold. Finding the holds that fit your hands, your feet, your fears, your strengths, your way of moving and feeling your way forward, your centre of gravity and gaze. And trust.

And also, often, there is holding onto cake. And discovering, of course, that climbers love to hold Robin. And one day, finding a tiny hazelnut beneath the crag, a little thing holding “all that is made”*. And thinking about all the rocks there are to hold. To be held by. And by the air, and by the sky.

*Julian of Norwich.

Last thing. This post comes with a thank you. To a few people who know things about holding onto rocks, and holding people too. Climbout Festival and Patrice and Emily and the Climbing Clan and Nicola and Tamzin and Ben. And mum and dad for stopping the car.