Why Adventure & Life Coaching?

Life isn’t always easy.

It comes with obstacles and challenges that don’t always have a road map. We all have answers to overcome life challenges, but we often need help finding them to achieve success and the life we desire. This is where a Life Coach becomes an asset - and I believe adding adventure into the mix is the best recipe.

Over the years with Life and Adventure Sports, I’ve had one recurring finding: The universal challenges of life and the human condition mirror the personal struggles we experience during the challenge intrinsic to Adventure Sports.

A lot has to do with fear and how it holds us back from what we truly desire. Rooted in fear, there’s normally challenge and struggle involved in attaining meaningful achievements. But how do we overcome these roadblocks?

For most of us, seeing the paraglider sail through the air, the scuba diver 100 feet under the surface of the ocean; or the mountain climber standing atop a monolith appears attractive and exhilarating. Then, almost instantly, the little voice inside reminds us how scary getting to that point must be, that it can’t be safe and it’s not for us.

It’s the same voice that reminds us to look both ways when crossing the street and kept our ancestors alive when Saber-toothed tigers were a threat. This voice can also convince us to neglect difficult conversations with our partners, pursuing business endeavors, or confronting the workplace bully.

This voice is our fear-based survival system speaking to. Although it keeps us alive by calculating risk, it also holds us back from living our best lives.

What’s the antidote? Confidence, of course. But how do we build and garner the confidence to become our most empowered and effective selves?

By becoming comfortable with fear through adventure and choosing to push through the resistance.

We start with self-awareness and understanding of how the mental and physiological mechanism of fear works, and more importantly how this shows up in our body and mind. Next, we partake in a well-planned adventure with safety contingencies built-in to reduce the risk of physical harm.

The rock climber uses ropes and anchors. The scuba diver uses redundant secondary breathing equipment, and the skydiver has a backup parachute. There is always a level of risk involved with adventure, but we minimize it with proper equipment and planning. Adventure activities are safe when done properly.

The inner work happens when we experience formidable and challenging situations during our safe and well-planned adventure. The opportunity to observe how we react to our fear presents itself. We can also observe what patterns of excuse-making, mechanisms of coping, and self-soothing we employ when experiencing fear and resistance. With the help of a guide or coach encouraging us, we can often overcome and achieve the adventure goal we’ve planned.

Post adventure we reflect and take inventory. If we chose to back down, bail, or not push through the fear there is work to do. It’s given us evidence of our pattern of giving-in to fear. This evidence allows us to devise a strategy of how to push through the fear on our next attempt. We can also take stock of how these patterns show up in our lives and how we allow them to hold us back. Armed with a new evidence-based plan we try again.

When we achieve the adventure goal, we experience a new sense of pride and personal power, our Life Force, fully charged. Serious inner work is done. We feel on top of the world and unstoppable, ready to take on life’s more subtle fear-inducing challenges because we have evidence of our power, and how to overcome fear.

The point is to intentionally place ourselves outside of the comfort zone to craft a life of empowerment and adventure. It’s where the magic happens. I’m hoping that for some of you readers this blog is enough encouragement to go try my method. For others that would prefer guidance, I’m here for you.

Click Here to contact Life Force Coach - Kevin Venn and let’s get to work.