The Training For Mountaineering Podcast
Jun 12, 2026 · 8 min · 10 segments
In this episode, I explore a dead-simple mindset technique a mountaineer can use to manage stress and nerves in the lead-up to a challenging expedition. == Interested in online training for…
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Now, getting nervous before a challenging adventure is normal.
We all go through it, whether it's just a big, challenging day hike or all the way up to the biggest mountain you've ever done in your life, we all get a little bit of nerves before we're stepping outside our comfort zone.
It is part and parcel of just stepping into a uni-unique challenge, which is physically demanding, but also out in nature, which is unpredictable, and it's totally normal to get a little bit nervous.
But all too often, and especially if we are stepping into something that is outside our comfort zone, that we've been building up to for months, that is something that is uniquely challenging, all too often those nerves can start to morph into something that's just a little bit more overwhelming.
Instead of just having that, you know, good nerves, it begins to kinda take over our thoughts day after day.
It goes from that excitement to like, "I'm getting more anxious." We can go to bed at night, and we can just lie there, and the thoughts are just going over, over, over our head.
We start catastrophizing.
We start thinking about all these things.
We start, start thinking about, "What happens if things go wrong? How are we gonna tell everyone this and that and all that?" It can absolutely get in the way of our s- sleep, and it can affect us in so many different ways, and these nerves and this stress can build and build and build.
Now, not only does this suck, not only can this disrupt our sleep, may put us in a bad mood, um, and just ruin this last little period before an adventure where you should be excited and ready to go, but you're just going the other way.
In the worst case scenario, this can actually get so bad that we can end up convincing ourself that our adventure, our climb, our trek, or whatever we're doing is gonna be a failure before we even start.
And the tricky thing with this, as we talked about on this podcast before, what we think mentally can often affect us physically, and if we are convinced that things are gonna be super hard, they're gonna be challenging, they're gonna be grueling, it can end up being a self-fulfilling prophecy.
So to prevent this, doing a little bit of work on your mindset in the big lead-up to an adventure can be very, very useful.
Now, getting nervous before a challenging adventure is normal.
We all go through it, whether it's just a big, challenging day hike or all the way up to the biggest mountain you've ever done in your life, we all get a little bit of nerves before we're stepping outside our comfort zone.
It is part and parcel of just stepping into a uni-unique challenge, which is physically demanding, but also out in nature, which is unpredictable, and it's totally normal to get a little bit nervous.
But all too often, and especially if we are stepping into something that is outside our comfort zone, that we've been building up to for months, that is something that is uniquely challenging, all too often those nerves can start to morph into something that's just a little bit more overwhelming.
Instead of just having that, you know, good nerves, it begins to kinda take over our thoughts day after day.
It goes from that excitement to like, "I'm getting more anxious." We can go to bed at night, and we can just lie there, and the thoughts are just going over, over, over our head.
We start catastrophizing.
We start thinking about all these things.
We start, start thinking about, "What happens if things go wrong? How are we gonna tell everyone this and that and all that?" It can absolutely get in the way of our s- sleep, and it can affect us in so many different ways, and these nerves and this stress can build and build and build.
Now, not only does this suck, not only can this disrupt our sleep, may put us in a bad mood, um, and just ruin this last little period before an adventure where you should be excited and ready to go, but you're just going the other way.
In the worst case scenario, this can actually get so bad that we can end up convincing ourself that our adventure, our climb, our trek, or whatever we're doing is gonna be a failure before we even start.
And the tricky thing with this, as we talked about on this podcast before, what we think mentally can often affect us physically, and if we are convinced that things are gonna be super hard, they're gonna be challenging, they're gonna be grueling, it can end up being a self-fulfilling prophecy.
So to prevent this, doing a little bit of work on your mindset in the big lead-up to an adventure can be very, very useful.
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