Finally confident at the gym!
Kind of a long rant, sorry!!
I started climbing in December and my local gym isn’t very big, so even when it’s not busy it somehow still feels like everyone can see literally everything you’re doing. I have pretty bad social/performance anxiety and usually climb alone, so for a while I was honestly close to quitting. I’d go and walk around staring at routes and then talk myself out of trying them because someone might watch me fail. And if I did attempt to project something and somebody else flashed it right after I’d immediately lose all confidence and move on.
I started going in the mornings when it was quieter, and if the gym started filling up I’d just hide in the training area instead. Eventually realized that trapping myself on the treadmill holding weights while watching youtube/netflix actually helped my endurance a ton, so my avoidance strat turned into training. Now I’m climbing stuff that felt impossible a few months ago and flashing climbs I couldn’t even start before. I’ve also slowly gotten more comfortable climbing around other people and I even asked a stranger to film this vid for me which felt mildly terrifying lmao.
Anyway, this is a really fun V2/3 traverse they set a few days ago :)