I think the first time I ever experienced true inner peace was alone, high up a canyon in the Santa Catalina Mountains of Tucson, Arizona, back in 2022.
Finger Rock Trail #42: about 2.5 miles up, around 5500 feet in elevation. I had hiked alone before, but never on a trail so technical, long, steep, and with so few other people hiking.
I remember sitting on a rock at my turnaround point, looking around at the striking beauty of the canyon. For the first time in my life, I felt at ease. No anxiety nagging at my brain or body. It’s like a weight was lifted off of me. For the first time in my life, I could finally breathe without worrying about my next breath.
I’ve realized since then how much I have, and still do, deal with anxiety daily. I’m not sure why that moment stands out to me as a pivotal instant of peace, but it does.
Maybe this is why I enjoy spending so much time alone in the mountains: it’s a time for me to decompress, reconnect with nature and my surroundings, to feel a part of something bigger. I love being in tune with everything around me. I love not hearing the noise of the city, not being confined by manmade walls, not being around anyone, or having to worry about them.
When I’m in the mountains, all I have to think about is putting one foot in front of the other, observing my surroundings, being with my thoughts without distractions, and ensuring my survival. I enjoy moments like these when I am confident, competent, and cautious. I’m pretty good at all that by now, being a hyper-independent mountain woman, yet I still make mistakes now and again.
For myself, I believe there are two lessons to be learned from this:
Learn to manage your anxiety in all situations the way you can in solitude on top of a mountain. How could you ease your anxiety if you were stuck in an elevator with a dozen strangers?
I tend to value my independence too much, to the point where I use it to justify pushing others away by not sharing certain parts of myself that I’m anxious to express to people.
Share yourself with others more. Let them take the lead, teach you, and take care of you. You can both give and receive these things.
Open yourself up to more in life. Take risks. Be vulnerable. Mess up, apologize, and move on. You don’t have to do it all on your own, Riley.
I’m moving in two weeks and have spent a lot of time in the past month reflecting on the time I’ve gotten to spend in Arizona. In part to go birding and in part to clear my mind, I went on a hike in Sabino Canyon today. I stopped at a creek to listen to the running water and ended up writing a bit. I found myself recollecting a moment that made me realize how often I’m living with anxiety. I think because I deal especially with social anxiety, I value alone time a lot . . . which leads me to my independence streak.
More recently, I have been reflecting on the ways I view and value my independence. While I’ve always seen it as a virtue, lately I’ve been realizing that because it borders the line of hyper-independence, it can often manifest as an excuse to not open up to people. To push them away and protect myself from the potential of rejection or conflict, or the fear of another failed relationship, platonic or otherwise. I sometimes choose to just help myself rather than risk accepting that of others. It is a risk to ask for or accept help, and I need to learn to be okay with that.
While my independence allows me to be okay with doing things like hiking and traveling solo as a young woman, it can hinder my ability to create and maintain deep connections. In moments of unease, I have always fallen back on my independence, likely hauling myself to the nearest trailhead for a long, difficult hike. What I instead need is to allow myself to lean into other people and be okay with accepting their support. I keep having to remind myself that some people out there do want to help me. I am not alone in my struggles. No one is.
It’s scary being vulnerable, especially about mental health. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned since living here, it’s that the more you do something, the easier it becomes.
I hope this explains the lessons I took from my piece. I tend to learn a lot of lessons metaphorically through nature. This is just one of many examples.
Here are some pictures I took today, after finally picking up a camera other than my phone for the first time in probably five years:
