Adventuring outdoors gives us learning, personal growth and a satisfied sense of ‘I am absolutely flipping amazing’. Key to this is knowing what our individual comfort zones around different elements of adventuring are, and creating a careful balance of being in, and out of these.
It seems that women are well placed to complete long, tough, journeys, races, and events because they plan well, are organised and can multi-task. Fewer women than men may enter ultra-distance trail running races but proportionately more women finish. We want to balance being prepared and organised with enough of the unknown that will give us the adventure we crave.
The balance of being in and out
The more we do something, the bigger the comfort zone around it becomes. The more we do more different things, the greater number of comfort zones we will find ourselves in. By mixing and matching the things we feel comfortable doing with the things we don’t feel comfortable with, we’re creating opportunities to learn and develop.
To have a great time on our big adventure we don’t want to be out of too many of our comfort zones, but we do want to be out of some of them. Common sense should tell us which ones! If we’re going to do a solo multi-day mountain route, we need to be firmly in our route planning, navigation, essential kit and clothing comfort zones, but this could be the trip we push our experiences and do a longer trip by ourselves, wild camp or make all our own food to take.
Getting ourselves into comfort zones
We can try things out in a safe environment to learn about them, and practice at home doing the fiddly things like lighting the stove and cooking food, working out how our navigation kit fits together, and how to put our crampons on, until they become familiar.
Practice packing and unpacking rucksacks, panniers or drybags – especially if we’re going to fill them up to the max. If we don’t know if we can carry a 15kg rucksack for a 14 day trip, we should carry it for 2 days over similar terrain and see what happens.
Where to focus the worry
Don’t over-worry about not remembering exactly how to put the tent up – that will be something you’ll work out and people love helping other people with their tents!
Outdoor adventures are the perfect opportunity to not worry about daily showers, hair washing and clothes changes – enjoy the liberation!
We need to focus on keeping our feet and other parts of our bodies healthy and in one piece. Blisters, chafing, sunburn, and sprained ankles ruin adventures – they bring us down and everything starts to feel hard.
We need to look after ourselves really well and have kit that will help us do this. This includes good food that you are bodies will appreciate. Ideally this is not the time to be eating rubbish food – we’re on an adventure we’ve been looking forward to and we probably need lots of good fuel to make the most of it.
My own adventure comfort zones
There’s a danger of being in too many comfort zones getting in the way of a really good adventure!
I’ve spent a fair amount of time on multi-day walks in different places – sometimes alone and sometimes with family. I have a good understanding of how mountains behave and the challenges of being out in them day after day.
I’ve had the same rucksack, tent and cooking set up for years and have got managing all of that down to a tee. I make all my own food, know what I need and how to cook it. It can still take me 2 hours from waking up to being packed up, but what’s the rush – I’m on holiday!
I also know what to wear for days in the hills and nights in tents or bothies. My trusty ACAI skinny trousers and thermal base layer tops will be essential kit for my upcoming week in the Highlands.
And the comfort zone I’m often not in
Navigation!
I have to be super detailed in my route planning to start to rehearse what the route will be like. The more I understand about distances between key points, the shape of mountain summits, where the descent will start, where there could be dodgy river crossing, the easier I find the real time navigation. However, I wouldn’t say that I find it easy or natural and spend a lot of time looking at the map, instead of feeling confident in using the skills that I’ve learnt on my numerous navigation course.
I’m working hard to grow my navigation comfort zone.
So, if you’re planning your next big adventure, build a strong foundation of the comfort zones you’re happily in to give you the confidence to tackle the things you’re less confident about. It’s how we learn and develop.
Just make sure you’ve practiced easy and immediate access to your energy and morale-boosting adventure snack stash – you don’t want that to be outside a comfort zone!
This post was written by guest blogger Kate Garner.