What I’ve Learned: Emily Harrington
Emily Harrington, age 29, from Tahoe, California: a former international competition champion, sport/trad/mixed climber and mountaineer.
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This article was published in Rock and Ice issue 236 (August 2016).
I’ve decided that in climbing in the mountains, for me the best thing is to do it with skis on my back. That was the best part of [attempting] Makalu last year. I’d love to climb 5.14c just because I love sport climbing and still enjoy pushing myself in that world. I think I’m going to the Red in October to try to make that happen.
***
My biggest challenge is trying to balance the two passions that I have. They don’t go well together. When you return
from high altitude you’ve lost a lot of muscle, and it’s really hard to find that snap again. It takes a while for me to get it, and
then when I lose it, it seems like I’m climbing at square one. I’m figuring it out, in the last few years: how to train for all these
things I like to do.
***
I’ve figured out that to stay motivated I need to have some sort of balance. I’m not going to sport climb year round. Maybe physically
I would climb harder, but then I don’t find much joy in it.
***
I think balance is the biggest thing, the most important thing in life, figuring it out. My life was a lot more simple
when I lived in Boulder and went to school and trained in the gym and just focused on one thing.
***
Now I have a home that I love and a boyfriend that I love [Adrian Ballinger, Everest guide], and he does his own thing, so I’ve sort of
complicated my life. Now is the time to do all those things I want to do. Just go to the mountains and go skiing and go on big mountain
expeditions and drive down to Yosemite for a few days … I know that in the future if I have a family that I can still do them, but
it won’t be with the same level of freedom.
***
I really enjoy going on these big epic experiences that break me down to nothing. I think back on those and maybe it was the hardest time and maybe the most lonely and scared, but maybe they’re the most vivid and fond memories. I find myself yearning for those experiences.
***
Rock climbing and the style of climbing that I engage in is far safer than anything I’ll ever do in skiing … Most accidents in rock climbing
are because of human errors, and a lot of things that happen in the big mountains are because you don’t have control over things.
***
That’s another balancing act. [Risk is] something I think about all the time. Especially with Adrian and what he does with his job and with me delving more into this world, I’ve learned that it’s a risk that I’m accepting … The only thing I can really control is my decision-making and my education and my experience, so building those things has been really important to me. The conservative decision in big mountains is almost always the right one.
***
[If I could do it all again] I think I would have had more fun. I was pretty serious. I have way more fun now than I did before. I would tell
that to a 17-year-old competition climber.
***
I learned [from comps] how to focus on the moment. You’re in a climbing comp and have six minutes to climb the finals route. I learned how to be present, and I can draw from that all my life.
***
I learned [from 5.14 sport climbing] how to keep trying. That was just straight-up perseverance. I learned about this process that you go through as
a rock climber, when things feel so impossible at first and [about]slowly solving that puzzle and having it all come together. I learned to have
confidence in that.
***
I’ve learned that Mount Everest is like this microcosm of the world. It’s just this crazy, fascinating, almost- like-an-experiment of humanity,
and people are obsessed with it, and they love it and they hate it. And the only thing I can say is that things are not always what they seem,
and it’s really complicated.
***
Sometimes I’m really angry about [Everest]. Sometimes I think I hate [it], I think it’s so stupid and can’t wait until Adrian never
has to go there again. Other times I think it’s this really amazing place, and it should be protected, and we should think about it in a really
open way.
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