The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett - Most Replayed Moment: Fear Is A Skill You Can Train! Lessons From The World's Greatest Climber

Episode Date: August 14, 2026

What if fear isn’t something you need to overcome? Alex Honnold is the legendary professional rock climber behind Free Solo, best known for becoming the first person to free solo Yosemite’s 3,000-foot El Capitan without ropes or safety equipment. In this moment, Alex explains why he still feels fear, and how decades of repeatedly confronting it have changed the way he responds to it. He reveals how to make seemingly impossible challenges feel manageable, and shares a provocative perspective on modern life and what it means to feel free. Listen to the full episode here! Spotify: https://g2ul0.app.link/ZkT5tn2Wz5b Apple: https://g2ul0.app.link/abbjfEaXz5b Watch the Episodes On YouTube: ⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/c/%20TheDiaryOfACEO/videos Alex Honnold: https://www.alexhonnold.com/

If your kids came to you, you have two girls, right? Yeah. If they came to you and said, Dad, like, give me advice more what I should aim at in life. Would you tell me? I wouldn't get my advice. I'd be like, you'd do you. You find the thing you love to do, go hard. You know, basically like, learn some skills, get good at something.

Like, what do you like to do? I mean, that's kind of the thing for me, especially with climbing, is like, if someone had told me, like, you're going to train climbing for the rest of your life, I'd be like, oh, that sounds like kind of a grind, you know? Because, I mean, it is hard work. You're like hiking uphill with a heavy backpack and it's cold and it's windy. It's like it's basically physically uncomfortable. I mean, being a professional rock climber means that you're physically

uncomfortable all the time. Like often, you know, like, it's hard. Yeah. But if you're doing it because you freaking love doing it, it doesn't feel very hard. And so, I mean, I think the key for a kid is find the thing that doesn't feel like hard work. And when you started, were you scared of big, tall rock faces and stuff like that? I mean, yeah, I had like a healthy intimidation of things. I mean, like my first season in E70, the first time seeing L-CAP as a climber.

I was 19, and it looks impossible. It looks completely insane. I was like, that's so big. But then, you know, within a couple seasons, you know, I climbed some bigger walls, learned how to climb. And then a friend and I had the sort of season goal, like we were going to climb New 70 all season with the aspiration at the end to climb El Cap in a day.

So basically there was this long progression on El Cap specifically where it's like you go from just trying to get up it to trying to get up it faster to trying to get up it with just your hands and feet, still using protection. But basically there's like all these steps you can take. And so over a bunch of seasons, I climbed a El Cap like 60 times, different routes, all these different things. And then eventually you're sort of like, oh, maybe I can start thinking about freesoling it,

which is where the film Free Solo comes in. And then eventually you do this thing. But then people are like, well, aren't you scared? And you're kind of like, well, I've spent 10 years, like building up on this thing. I guess that's what people don't see. Yeah. So they just... I mean, like the documentary Free Solo, I think, does a pretty good job,

but showing the direct preparation, like the training involved in doing that specific climb. But it just doesn't show the, like, eight years before the... that, I guess, because the documentary was filmed over two years, and I guess I'd been going since 2006, so it was nine years before that that I've been going to Yosemite, and I've been spending maybe three months a year climbing walls. I guess that's the illusion of all people that do great things and become like athletes or sprinters or whatever Ronaldo or Messi is you don't get to see the... Yeah, the whole life that they put into doing the thing.

Yeah. So it looks like a magic trick when we see the outcome. We show up on Netflix to watch you climb Taipei. We're like, whoa. Yeah. hanging with it from his leg. Yeah, I mean, people watch some of those programs and they're like, he just walked up and did it. And you're like, well, yeah, after 30 years of practice, like, I just walked up and did it.

But no, it's not like just walking up and doing it. I mean, like, I've literally been climbing five days a week for 30 years. Like, that's so much climbing. Like, I freaking love climbing and I climb a lot. On this idea of like exposure therapy, as it relates to like fear and anxiety and confronting one's things that terrify them, was there in the early days. Were you, like, scared at some point? Oh, all the time. That's actually something that I think, you know, I've obviously done so many interviews around fear and like managing fear and all that. And I've talked about fear a lot of different ways over the years. And I think as I've found older,

I've sort of come to realize that actually you're just scared all the time as a climber. Like, low level fear, like, but you're, but climbing is fundamentally scary. Like, it's always kind of scary because there's always consequences. Like, even if you're climbing with a rope, you're still always visualizing like what happens if the rope breaks like what if you know like is this safe like you know is the gear good like is this actually safe and so you're always a little bit scared and so after years and years of always being scared you get pretty good at managing that kind of stuff because there's a lot of misconception swirling around this brain scan you yeah no i hate all that stuff that's just all from the film free solo it was like too short of a scene in the film they needed

a little more they need to let a breathe you know explain things a little better i think so they scanned a control subject, another person scans you, looked at the amygdala in your brain, and that the conclusion that a lot of people have arrived at is that you don't experience fear because when they look at these two brain scans, your amygdala is lighting up less when you're shown scary images, basically, right? But like shown just this image, like, what does that even mean? Like, my brain's purple and his brain is orange. You're like, what does that mean? Like, I don't know.

But no, I mean, the thing is, though, and this is what I wish was explaining the film better, is that this is, we're being shown black and white photos inside an fMRI. So you're inside a sealed metal tube, you're totally safe, you're physically safe and comfortable, and you're being shown black and white photos. And so to me, obviously that's not going to light up the fear response to my brain because you're looking at pictures. You're like, who cares? I'm totally safe.

But in a control subject, you know, apparently your brain sort of response to images one way or another. But I'm kind of like, I've been climbing for 20 years, so I've been like scared quite a lot. And you're kind of like, well, black and white photos start to lose their edge if you've been scared all the time for 20 years. So it's like, obviously that's not going to trigger much. Yeah, and I imagine everybody in their life can think of a scenario where they have mastery that would, like a stand-up comedian looking out at a stage, probably wouldn't be as scared as me.

Yeah. Because that would terrify me. So, again, this is not necessarily some sort of neurological deficiency. No, I mean, I think the real takeaway is that I have an amygdala, and it works. You know what I mean? Because I think if the results had shown that I was missing my amygdala, then I would have all kinds of, I would have died already at youth because I wouldn't be able to function as a human, basically. But, you know, it's shown something like that where there are, like, structural differences or, like, some real change.

But this is basically just showing that after 20 years of conditioning, I respond differently than an average person. And you're like, yeah, no kidding. Like, if you put a monk into an fMRI, their brain response totally differently than an average person as well. Which I actually think is a really inspiring conclusion because it means that we can all grasp our fears better. And even, you know, people won't know this about me, but 10 years ago, I sat down. on camera with my friend Ash in his apartment to record a two-minute video. And as I sat there, I was so scared I couldn't get the words out. So you actually, in this two-minute video that comes out, you see it go from night and day

in the background just because we did that many cuts over seven hours, try and get me to say two minutes on camera. And obviously, after 10 years of being on camera, I can now speak without shitting myself. And I imagine my brain state looks significantly different because of my exposure therapy. Totally. Yeah, you should do the fMRI. Yeah, you should have done 10 years ago because then you'd have your control and then you do it now and it'd be totally different. But also the psychologists I've sat with all confirm this.

They talk about exposure therapy. Yeah. And I went through exactly the same thing with public speaking. Like I was always so afraid of public speaking. I was also very shy and like just not like it was terrifying. And now because of the free solo film tour and, you know, all the public things I've done since then, I'm like basically fine. You know, it's like you still got a little nervous. But it's like basically easy now. You're kind of like, well, that's a total change. It's like obviously there's a tremendous capacity for humans to learn. People talk to you about fear all the time because, I mean, your work... Because climate's really freaking scary.

It's makes sense. It's totally understandable. Yeah. Yeah. And they also realize, I think, at some deep level, that the thing holding them back from who they think they want to be or who they aspire to be is fear often. It's judgment of someone else. It's taking a risk.

Totally. So you've become, for many people, they're like, tell me, tell me how to overcome. Yeah. Well, I think that everyone's like, what's your hack? to overcome fear. And you're like, there's no hack. You just get really freaking scared over and over for so long. And eventually it's not that scary anymore.

But I will say that that's like a very enduring way to overcome your fear. It's like if you're willing to go through that process, then you are actually unafraid. You know, because like you can do like hacks. I mean, you can, you can like crank up loud rock music and just go for it. You know, like, and there are plenty of examples of that in what I'd call gravity-assisted sports. Like say if you're going to jump a cliff on skis, like you can get to the edge. You'd be like, this is really scary. And then be like, three, two, one, do it.

and just like go. In climbing, you can't really do that as much because it's so slow. Like when you climb, you make one move and then you make another move. And then you're like, do I still want to be here? Like, it basically fear creeps in a lot more. But sort of in gravity-assisted sports, you can have more of that moment where you just like overcome your fear and then it happens. You know, like making a big drop in a kayak or like skis or things like that. Whereas like once you commit, it's happening one way or another. Anyway, there's a lot to get into it.

No, but I mean, I want to get into it. I watched a video of you climbing half dome, I think it was. And it looks like you got scared halfway up or? Yeah. Yeah. So that video is actually filmed later. So the voiceover in that video is me talking about the experience of me free-soling when I was totally alone. And I did get really scared on half-dom and I had this whole somewhat traumatic climate experience and you're the top of the wall.

But then when we went back to film it, I had a different traumatic experience while we were filming. Less traumatic. But like very scary for a moment. And they got that on camera. So they basically in the film, they just cut the two together as like because it shows me like being really scared. What's half-dome to start with? And then what was the trantic experience? Yeah, so half dome for anyone who hasn't seen is this just totally amazing wall in

Yosemite. It's a 2,000 foot granite face. Actually, it's the North Face logo. It's a freaking, that's half dome. Oh, okay. Yeah, so it's like an iconic wall in Yosemite. It looks like half of a dome. But actually, it's more like a hockey puck just shoved in. It's actually a full dome, depending how you look at it.

But the northwest face is vertical for 2,000 feet. It's incredible. And so I free-sold, that was one of the first, like, major free-sol I did in 2008. and one of the things that sort of made me a professional climber in a way. But when I did the climb, I did the bare minimum preparation. I basically, like, didn't know. It was the biggest thing I'd ever free soloed. I didn't quite know how to, like, go by getting ready for it.

Anyway, I climbed it and basically hadn't practiced enough. It was really freaking scared, got off route, got confused, skip some stuff. And then at the very top had this whole moment of extreme panic. You know, basically, like, got up into some stuff and all sort of, like, crumbled mentally and like sort of barely managed to finish the upper slab. Like the hardest part of the climb was like right near the top. I was trying to walk across this ledge. Basically, I've walked across that ledge face in and face out.

Normally people hand traverse it or they crawl across it. They're like different ways to go across the ledge, and I've done it every which way. And then we were up there filming, and I was like, oh, I'm going to walk it face out. But it turns out when you walk and face out, it's really freaking scary. And so I made it kind of halfway and was like, oh, my gosh.

And then bailed. And when you say you were having like a crisis in your mind, What is that? Is that just, oh my God, what I'm... Like, how does that sound when you... Well, I mean, so in this case, so walking across this ledge, it's like it starts maybe as a foot wide,

so your foot is fully on the ledge and you're shuffling across it, but then at a certain point, yeah, I mean, that's... Put it on the screen for anyone watching. Yeah, that's the ledge. But basically, at the narrowest part, your feet are sticking out over the lip of it,

and the wall bulges ever so slightly, so it forces your back out a little. And so you're basically, like, rocking on your heels with, I don't know, like a 1700, foot drop or something there, 1,800 foot drop, like straight down below you. And so, you know, it's like pretty, it's pretty intense. Anyway, and so I thought I was going to walk across it like that. And I made it to the bulging part and was suddenly like, oh my God, this isn't like, this isn't

for me. And then managed to like shuffle back and change my strategy. Is it like panic in your head? It's not panic, but you're like, oh, oh, I made the wrong choice. Like, this is bad. This is bad. I mean, it's not like full like five alarm bell like panic panic. But yeah, you're like, oh, I'm so screwed. And you have fallen a long way before. I was hearing about a time when you were young and you fell off a mountain and called your mother, managed to call your mother in. Yeah, that was like sliding down an icy cooler type thing.

It's a little different than like free falling off of a cliff that's like sliding down a mountain. But yeah, I got totally messed up. And yeah. Yeah, and I've like broken my arm several times as a kid falling off things. And then with a rope as a climber, you take big. fall is like routinely you know when you have protection that's like part of the sport basically i mean it's certainly easy to visualize falling 700 you know when you're like standing on a little ledge and you're bulging and you're looking down you're you know it's easy to be like oh my god

you know it's like if you just bend forward a little bit you're just going to take a swan dive like 7000 feet to the ground the stats in this sport are i mean of fatalities how do they compare to other sports safer than you would think that's things everyone thinks it seems crazy but it's not that crazy. I don't know actual statistics, but I suspect that it's actually pretty comparable to skiing or something. You know, because like recreational skiers die all the time, like falling in tree wells or like going off cliffs backs and or things like that.

Climbing is actually surprisingly safe, which is one of the things I love about climbing. I mean, climbing is very, it's very sort of binary where it's like either you're totally safe or you're going to die. and the odds of you dying are very, very, very small. But because they're there, they always keep you on. You know what I mean? Like it basically keeps you alert, but you're never really going to get hurt. Is that including free-selling?

Yeah, I mean, for the most part. I mean, a couple people have died free-souling. I mean, people occasionally die free-soling for sure. But actually, most of the sort of cutting-edge free solists have not died to soloing. They've, like, died in other things. I think it was then in the documentary on Netflix, Free Solo, where one of your colleagues... Yeah, Tommy is like, most Free Solos are dead now, which is kind of true, but it's slightly misstated.

I mean, you know, he's just like speaking off the cuff, and it's not, like, strictly true. Like, a couple of the best Free Soloes have died Free Soling, though they died on very easy terrain. But then the majority of other great Free Solos have died in sort of climbing adjacent accidents, like Wing-Suit base jumping and, like, one got swept to see by a rogue wave. like while he was out climbing a sea cliff, but he was like standing on shore and got swept out to sea. You know, things like that where you're just kind of like, you know, obviously they're taking risks in their lives

and they wind up dead, but it's not the way that people think. You know, you see a photo like that and you're like, freestoling, you're going to die for sure. And they're kind of like, well, people don't actually really die that way. I mean, they have. I mean, not to say that it doesn't happen, but way less frequently than people would suspect. If I was to try and like, you know, professionally torture you,

and again, I'm not talking in extremes here, But what life would I prescribe you to live? Oh, being like a finance bro or something. Having to like just work spreadsheets my whole life. Is that what you mean? Like what is my like worst? I don't know, something like that. Or honestly being like a choreographer for dance or something.

Like I just couldn't do like or being like an opera singer. Like I would just kill myself. I just couldn't do that. Why would being a finance bro be like the worst thing for Alex? Just the idea of sitting a computer in a cubicle. Just like typing. I mean, I'm kind of contrarian. I don't want to, like, rules. I don't want to, like, jump through hoops. I don't want to do

arbitrary things. Like, I don't want some manager to come and tell me, like, oh, you've got to file that report again. You, like, missed a line. I'd be like, you go F or so. You know, I was just, like, walk out of the building. Like, it's just, I just, like, I just, like, don't know if I could take that. I'd be like, no. But that's, like, we'll live in, like, you know. I just don't know if it's for me.

I don't know. I mean, doesn't that just seem... I mean, I had this moment. I've been in New York couple days and I took the subway down to see some, see some friends. And I was like coming out of the tunnel and it's like packed with people. And I was just like looking at the ground. And I was like just, you know, following someone else's footsteps up this like beat down path of stairs. And I was like, I couldn't live like this. Like not day in and day out every day.

Like this is just like feeling like you're just doing the exact same thing as everyone else around you. I'm like, oh, it seems so so boring. It's funny because so many of us look at your life and go, wow, that's not very normal. but actually maybe at a foundational level you're living a much more normal life than when you're out in nature you're moving your body yeah yeah in that way for sure

I'm like going on cool adventures and going out and I don't know I think that's also part of what the sort of attraction and allure with your life especially when you watch Free Solo is you do seem to be a free man in a way where most of us aren't free as such yeah I mean I think we're all sort of aspiring to that to some extent

I mean, most people see that, though, is like they get their vacation for the year. They're planning to retire at some point, and then they're going to have their freedom. You're kind of like, well, I don't know, I mean, maybe you've got to try to live that way as much as possible. If your young girls came up to you, June and Alice, and said, Dad, what is a meaningful life? Like, what are the principles of living a fulfilling meaningful life? Would you give them advice there? Yeah, yeah. I mean, it'd be a long, rambling, multi-day conversation with them about, but, I mean, following your own goals is, is, I think, you know, certainly one of the, the core.

of having a meaningful life. Like having things that you find valuable. I mean, really like living in line with your values, finding things that are important to you and pursuing them with as much as you can give them. When you look at your early years through 20s to 30s, it kind of looks like you're living like a Buddhist a little bit. I mean, yeah, I went on a trip once

where they called me the monk. Just because I was living such a sort of a seedic lifestyle. I was like reading, I've never, I don't drink and I don't like party and I just for personal preference, whatever. So I'm just like living in my little van and reading books and climbing all the time. Those are the things that I'm into doing. You know, it's like it's, yeah, it's just doing what you want to do. Have you ever been depressed or?

Yeah, probably not like deep clinical depression. But there's certainly periods from time to time where you're just like, what am I doing or why or what are my goals? Like, you know, what's and I think to me the most depressing thing is that, you know, I've put like my whole life into climbing, like trying to be the best you can be all the time. And sometimes you put tons effort in and you just don't see results. Like for whatever reason you just suck. You're like, I'm trying so hard and I'm just like not as good as I want to be. And like that's challenging. You know, but that's, I mean, everybody faces that to some extent where you're like,

I'm working hard at a thing, but I'm just not achieving the results that I want. And between that sort of that period of no man's like the 20 and 30 where your career hasn't taken off yet, the documentary's not out. You've not climbed Taipei. How much money are you earning from climbing? I mean, my first couple years, my sponsorship through the North Face was like, I think my first year was like 10K year. I was like, this is amazing because I was living in my car. And, you know, making 10 grand when you live by yourself in a van is like more than you need, basically.

It obviously went up beyond that at some point. But it was, you know, like in the 10 to 100 range for the first, for the whole, yeah, for years. Then at some point it increases. Yeah, and then it increases. I mean, then free solo is obviously like a big thing. thing. And that sort of opened up all these opportunities. Because then I started doing corporate speaking and stuff like that.

And I mean, as I'm sure you know, that's just like a whole different world. And so then you go from just like making some money from sponsors to like making money from other corporations. And they're like, okay, now you're making some money. One of the things when I was hearing you talk about some of your incredible climbing stories is I was trying to understand what role of visualization or your preparation plays and how that's like transferable to me and my life. We talked a little bit about just how much preparation you did for something like L-Cap. But it sounds like you really break down the challenge into smaller bits and then really go through those individual steps. Whereas a lot of people would just look at L-CAP and go,

oh my God, they'll be terrified. And that's impossible. Yeah, which is fair. I mean, I spent years looking at L-CAP and being like, that's too big, that's impossible. And then, you know, after years of that, I kept hoping that I would look at it and it would look easy somehow. And I'd be like, cool, now I'm going to do it.

And it just never looked easy. And so then finally I was like, okay, I'm going to have to like put some real work into it. And then I started slowly breaking it down. And then once you like break it into pieces and start working on the pieces, then you're kind of like, okay, it starts to feel more reasonable. Break it into pieces and start working on the pieces. What does that mean in terms of climbing? So if we, I mean, I've got this model here of type of one. So, you know, and this is also a metaphor for any challenge I have in my life.

But this is actually perfect because it's right here. Yeah. So I scouted this in September of this year. I did the climb in January. or whatever. In September we went and, well, we had to like, one, make sure it was possible before you sort of like commit to it doing a whole TV program. You're kind of like, let's make sure we can do this. And then they also had to get all this sort of marketing material. You'd like get the photos with the building, like all the stuff that becomes the trailer and whatever. And so we went in September

to sort of like do the prep. And so we basically checked out all the different pieces. And so anywhere where you see it looking a little bit different, you know, it's like this whole bottom part is like a low angle slab. It's like punctuated with these two little rubies. These are like coin things or whatever, the clouds or whatever there. And then there are the dragons on the corners. These are all overhanging. Each of these eight blocks is like a big overhanging thing. It feels a little bit different.

Then you get up here. There's like these balconies. These are actually overhanging. Like basically each little segment of this is quite different. You know, obviously on this model, like looks the same. But each transition between the different pieces is like a thing. So I checked out all of them with ropes. And yeah, you just go piece by piece all the way up the whole thing.

And you hadn't ever climbed it before we saw it on Netflix live? Well, I hadn't free solid to know, but I had climbed it. I climbed all the pieces with a rope for sure. I'd like checked out the different things. Okay, so you look at these as individual challenges every step. Yeah, it's like you go, even like just getting off the ground, the first move is a slightly different move than any of the other moves. You have to like jump up to a thing and like press it out.

Then climbing over these little clouds is a different thing. Each dragon is a different thing. Yeah, I mean, it's just, you know, there's a surprising amount of complexity to it. And so our first on the scout, you know, I had a note on my phone. I'm just like writing down all the different, basically I'm trying to learn it the way you study anything where I'm just like making notes and sort of like from floor 54 to 72. It feels like this. I climb the southeast corner, the left are at, you know, just, and then, yeah, just writing it all down. And I mean, there's this famous photo of you hanging with your leg.

Yeah, that's this. These are the rings up here. So you're hanging from here with your leg. Yeah. Now, I, and this is really a question of endurance. Like, how do you plan to have the energy? Like, how do you know if you're going to have enough energy when you're up here? when you're just planning it. I mean, this is what makes it exciting, because you can't be sure.

But, you know, I've done a lot of climbing in my life, and I've done a lot of climbs that were like 24 hours. I mean, I had this experience in Patagonia once. It was a 54-hour push, like the last 20 hours we hiked without food because we got caught in a storm. It's a whole crazy story. But basically, you know, I've had a lot of experience in my life where I've done hard exercise for more than 24 hours.

And so this, you know, I expected to take me somewhere in the hour and a half, two-hour range. And I'm kind of like, yeah, I mean, I'll be tired after two hours. of exercise, but I'm not going to be exhausted. You know what I mean? Like, I know that I have a much deeper reserve than that. So much of the conversation around, after you had done this, or some of the conversation was around whether this was a harder challenge than Al Capitan.

No. No, it's obviously much easier. I mean, I'm doing it on live television, you know, it's like, obviously it's easier. But what makes it cool is that it's different, it's fun, it's challenging. Like, for me, it's really, like, in my sweet spot where it is challenging enough, like, it's not easy. You know what I mean? Like saying easier than L-CAP, it doesn't.

You know, L-CAP was like a 10-year life project that I did an absolute secrecy. I did on my terms, on the correct day, after years of effort, I had failed attempts. You know what I mean? Like, L-CAP was like an all-consuming life project for years. Kind of like, obviously you can't do that for live TV. It's like you just can't put, anyway. But this was very much in my sweet spot where you're like, oh, it's hard enough that it's hard. Like, it's cool.

You know, like, it's fun. It's interesting. The climate is engaged. It's, you know, gave me something to train for months. It's like it's super fun. But it's not, you know, it's not like the absolute limit of what I can do. Because you just can't do that on live TV. I mean, if nothing else, I was climbing the southeastern ret because it gets good morning light and it looks beautiful and it's like great for filming.

But if I was trying to do the absolute most cutting edge climb I could do, I'd be climbing the northwest to red because it'd be full shade because it'd be good, better conditions, you know, be colder. Like you just don't want to be in the sun. It makes your skin, you know, it makes you hot and stuff. And so, you know, just things like that. You're like, well, if you're doing it for TV and you're trying to. of broadcast it, then you want it to look good. But like, if you're trying to do it for hard climbing in good conditions, you do it in full shade. And Netflix had a 10 second delay just in case you fell. I mean, I'm sure part of it is in case you fall, but part of it's like, what if somebody

unplugs one of the things? Or, you know what I mean? Like, it's so complicated. There's so much stuff going on. It's insane. Was there a hardest part of this, a part where you were at all nervous? The thing I was most nervous about when I started were the bamboo boxes, like doing these eight overheating segments because they're just so relentlessly the same move. And it's just, it's pretty physical. Like, you get tired for sure. I mean, the actual physical hardest moves, like actually randomly one of these corners up here would have been quite a hard move, but there was this freaking security camera

bolted out of the wall. And so you use the security camera as this handle. It was really pretty cool. And it was like bolted on with these giant bolts. So it, like, looked super safe. And, you know, it was like very robust and secure. But it would have been kind of like this extreme jump, which I wasn't, you know, it's probably possible, but would have been like a major thing.

But instead you just reef off the security camera. I was like, it's so cool. It was, uh, you said there were a few things like that, like individual moves that are kind of mussely. But overall, it's the, the stamina, like the challenge of doing this over and over for hundreds of feet that was the hardest thing. Do you have a conversation with your girls and wife before you go and do something like this about just in case you don't come back? Not with the kids because they're too young and, like, they wouldn't, they don't understand anyway. Um, and not with her because she came with me to Taipei or she was there for like the whole end of it. I went a little bit earlier so I could adapt to the times then more.

and like feel better. But basically she was with me. So, you know, like we went to bed together that night and I woke up that morning and had breakfast together. So it didn't feel like a big goodbye. You know, it was kind of actually she was with me at the base. Like we did the start together. And then I literally was like, okay, bye and walked over and did the thing and saw her again at the top. So we were only apart for like an hour and a half of the whole. You know, it was like, and I saw her through the window a couple times. And so it felt like she was just there having the whole experience with me. What you just listened to was a most replayed moment from a previous episode. If you want to listen to that full episode, I've linked it down below. Check the

description. Thank you.