I went skydiving and I survived. I am here to show and tell and share my experience with you all and encourage you to take on more risks in life which will change you forever!

Why Skydiving

Skydiving seems to be the ultimate challenge for the most people in life. It looks so scary and life threatening, but yet at the same time somehow safe.

When I told people that I am going skydiving, the typical response I heard was: “Why would I want to jump out of a perfectly good plane?” I did not know how to respond to those people. Maybe it was not for them. After all, it was their choice and their life.

I did not want to convince them to join me, but I knew that I had perfectly good reasons for skydiving:

• unique experience of a life time
• an exercise in overcoming the fear of fear
• making a tough decision and sticking with it
• challenging myself
• putting myself out of my comfort zone

Why I Went Alone

To my surprise I heard a couple of people saying that they wanted to go skydiving as well! I was excited! I did not want to do it alone!

Almost all of them told me: “Yea! It’s awesome! Let’s do it!”

Then I would follow up with them and all I would hear would be this: “Yea, I am busy that weekend”; “I had change of plans”, etc. I was disappointed, but I was expecting that. I came to expect for people to say one thing and do a different one. It seems that most of us are just scared of taking risks and rather stick with what we know.

Finally, I realized that if I waited for somebody else to come along , I would never end up go skydiving. I had to do it alone. So I just picked a date, signed up and waited to go skydiving. It felt good, but I was already getting nervous.

I Was Afraid

To be exact, I was afraid. No doubt about that. I had a list of questions and images running through my head:

• Am I going to die?
• If I die, is it going to be painful?
• How am i going to feel when I realize that I am going to die?
• Am I going to break my back?
• Is it safe?
• What if the parachute doesn’t go off?
• What if the plane crashes?
• How much experience does every body else have?
• What are the chances of death?
• What’s the worst thing that can happen?
• etc.

Luckily, I realized that skydiving is just like breathing to some people. I realized that I was not alone in my adventure. The Falling Illini president took me to the skydiving spot. He has done over 200 jumps! I did not even think that anybody would jump out of a plane more than once.

He was able to answer many of my questions and concerns and explained how everything worked. That provided me with some peace of mind. However, words did not mean much and I was as afraid as ever.

Still, I stuck with the plan. While we were driving, it all seemed surreal: I wasn’t really going to go skydiving; this is just a dream! Reality kicked in when we finally arrived and I saw the planes, the parachutes, the field, and people landing from 10,000 feet in the air.

I was not alone. People from all different ages, different levels of experience and different walks of life gathered that day to jump out of a perfectly good airplane.

Finally, I paid. The actions were set in motion and there was no turning back. . Slowly but surely, my turn to skydive came. As I was getting ready, I wanted to scream and shout: “Hold up! Can I have some more time? I am not ready! I need more time!” and so on. Yet, things just kept moving and before I knew it I was on the plane. What happened next is history.

I did it!

Lessons Learned

After I landed, I had a lot of time to think and relax. Everything that I just did started to sink in. Here is what I learned from the whole experience:

• Just do it! Just go ahead and do it. If it is something that you want to do, nothing will stop you. All you have to do is decide to do it. Once the first domino falls, the rest will seem seamless and easy. Deciding to do something is key.
• Face the fear. Diving into the unknown, into uncertainty is scary! But the only way to conquer that fear is to face and keep going despite it. Fear is just an emotion saying to you: “You are doing something you have not done before!” That’s great! You are exploring unknown territories within yourself. You are growing!
• Be prepared to go alone. Most people will not face the fear. They will stay where they are. They are not comfortable with the emotion of fear, but you are! That is why there is a chance that you will start alone. It might be discouraging, but rewards in life come with a price.
• You are not alone. You might start out alone, but you will not end up alone. There are other courageous people out there, who are carving their own destiny, their own path in life. Once you leave the ones that are afraid, you will me the ones who are courageous.
• Seek guidance. You are not the first and not the last to travel this new road that you chose. Others have done it. Find them. Find them and ask them questions. Their knowledge will enlighten your path and ease your fears. Uncertainty makes us afraid. We like to know things. So educate yourself about your fear until the uncertainty is gone!
• Prepare for a change. Once you face and overcome your fear, you will change. You will change in ways you did not expect. Your current environment, you current friends and your current lifestyle might not seem appropriate for the person that you have become. But that’s the price of change. Are you willing to pay?

I Changed

Indeed, after skydiving many things changed. Everything seemed so trivial. Skydiving was like whole new world that I have not realized existed. Coming back to “reality” was weird: the sky did not look the same, people did not look the same to me, my fears were not the scary any more.

Most importantly, I became comfortable with uncertainty. I became comfortable with taking risk and facing my fears. I became comfortable with making tough decisions is sticking by them. I felt like I was born all over again.

It’s Your Turn

You do not have to go skydiving to go skydiving. There are so many opportunities in life where you can put yourself at risk, face your fears and realize how trivial they were. You will start looking at a world through a different pair of glasses. Danger will turn in opportunity, fear will turn into growth.

Do you want to go skydiving without going skydiving? If so:

• Go speak in front of a large group of people – you will survive!
• Go ask the girl or guy out – you will survive!
• Stand up for yourself – you will survive!
• Quit your crappy job – you will survive!
• Do what you want to do – you will survive!

Not only you will survive, you will learn and grow and become stronger and stronger with each new experience!