In the summer of 2011, I was flying to a speaking gig when a blurb on the cover of the airline magazine caught my attention: Run Away to Circus School! The article described a course where you could learn how to “fly on the trapeze”.
Are you kidding? I chuckled to myself, Who’d be crazy enough to do that?! (Spoiler Alert: Me.)
The next morning, I was working out in the hotel gym. On the TV was a rerun of Sex and the City, and there’s Carrie Bradshaw, her knees slung over a trapeze bar, hanging upside down, paralyzed with fear. Her circus “coach” was trying to persuade her to let go so he could catch her.
This time I laughed out loud; but then I found myself thinking: Yesterday I was reading about Circus School – and today I’m watching Carrie frozen with fear on a trapeze. What a coincidence!
But I don’t believe in coincidences. I wondered, Does this mean I’M supposed to do that? And what the hell for?
Then I remembered that adventurous 8-year-old girl who desperately wanted to do gymnastics and wouldn’t let a silly thing like lack of strength or flexibility stand in her way. While today I’d call the process of learning each new and more difficult gymnastic trick “an exercise in overcoming fear and disbelief”, back then my mindset was, “Oh boy, am I going to have fun today!”
It was that fearless little girl who googled, “Circus School, California”, and discovered one was located in San Diego, just 40 minutes from my home. Uh-oh… the adult me sighed, looks like I’m going to Circus School,” and with trepidation, I dialed the number and signed up.
A week later, I arrive and am surprised to discover it’s at a private residence. I walk into this enormous backyard and catch my first glimpse of the trapeze. I crane my neck and squint my eyes to see the top platform that looks about a mile high from where I’m standing. What the hell was I thinking? I hope it’s not too late to get a refund!
“Welcome to Ground School,” Tom says, then gives us a run-through of the safety guidelines and basic takeoff position.
When it’s my turn, I’m equipped with a safety harness, hooked into the belay, then I climb the 60-foot ladder where an assistant, Sarah, greets me at the top. (Remember those cartoons where a character’s heart is thumping out of his chest? That’s me right about now.) I step onto the platform and Sarah replaces the ground safety line with an aerial one.
I hear Tom yell, “Listo!” which is Spanish for “ready.” The instructors use this word to communicate with each other that the flyer is preparing to leave the platform.
“Ready!” – English for “ready”, but trapeze-speak for “Grab hold of the bar and step to the end of the platform. ”
All of a sudden, I’m panicking, Am I strong enough to hold myself up?
Well, it’s a little late to think about that now, because Tom yells, “Hep!” the trapeze action command. In other words, “GO!”
I spring from the platform and I’m flying through the air with what I hope is the greatest of ease. Once I complete my swing, Tom yells, “Dismount!” and as I’ve been instructed, I let go of the bar, get into a pike position (legs out in front on me) and fall 60 feet to the net where I land flat.
WHOOSH! All the air comes out of me. I’m clutching the net unsure if I can move. How did Evan and Jerry make it look so damn easy? Even watching them go before me, acting like it was a walk in the park, hadn’t calmed my nerves.
“Off the net, Zann!” Tom calls out.
I crawl to the edge of the net and roll off. When my feet hit beloved terra firma, I can hardly stand up I’m shaking so badly. Before I can entertain doubts about going up again, I hear, “Zann, front and center!”
I join Tom and “the boys”, as I now refer to them, back at Ground School. We stand in front of a monkey bar where Tom teaches us the “Knee Hang”, and up comes a mental picture of Carrie dangling from the bar in absolute terror.
“Trapeze is all about timing,” Tom explains. “There’s a time to pull your legs up – at the pinnacle of the swing when you are weightless – and a time to take your hands off, and put them back on. Everything has to be done with split-second precision. There’s no time to second-guess yourself.”
You can read the whole story in my latest book, Outrageous Achievement, available on Kindle, Audible, and in paperback on Amazon. Bottom line: Taking risks is a key component of success – and your Mindset is the key to infinite potential. Every time you exercise stretching those “risk” muscles (and you don’t have to join the circus to do it!), you are developing your own infinite potential, and creating your own version of Outrageous Achievement.