[saiya-jin]

2 words for the path in the middle (sort of, at least for me) - adrenaline sports. I don't say which exactly should work for likes of others, that's kind of unique to each of us. For me its climbing, paragliding, skiing/ski touring, a bit of alpinism. Plus diving when near corals, also serious hiking.

Apart from making me properly happy (and some of those are easily post-work ones if you don't have kids, like climbing or paraglide depending on your place), they keep me amazingly fit, which is source of long lasting content from oneself. Vacations spent backpacking in crazy exotics (mostly south east asia) help too.

I can do boring and uninspiring software dev office job that pays the bills and some more (seldom intertwined with nice creative part when actually solving interesting problems, rather than drowning in processes and politics). It doesn't dent the content/happiness part a slightest bit.

Also numerous side effects - one starts eating healthier. Any kind of gaming addiction I had before was cured too, now its just waste of life that repulses me (not making critique - if that's your real kick I guess go for it, but I can't anymore).

There is one slight problem with this, although it otherwise worked me 100% for past 10 years - if you get kids and are not utter sellfish a-hole, you will lose most of this, at least for some (long) time. Positive side is, one day you will be one hell of inspiration for them. Other source of issues is accident - time off everything, for longer, can be depressive.

Talking as proud parent of two small kiddos who exhausted me during WFH to max, and who after 4 month recovery of messed up wrist broke his foot in kindergarten and is on crutches at least for next 6 weeks of amazing summer. I think right now the lowest point in my whole life so far due to all above. But that means it will only go up, eventually. Life is funny.

[unemphysbro]

Are you me? I've been slowly getting into alpinism in the Sierras and looking into getting my p2 cert. (I'd love to combine the two...imagine climbing in the palisades then paragliding or base jumping off )

I regrettably spent my 20s in academia and now I'm in tech and actually afford these hobbies. I'd love to have kids but I'm pushing it off because as you mentioned, it seems selfish.

I'm thinking about a SEA climbing holiday during the winter. I'm eyeing Vietnam. Do you have any favorite locale?

[saiya-jin]

I am from Europe, so probably can't recommend anything useful for you. But if you ever come by Geneva, Switzerland, we have fine indoor and outdoor places. Next one could be Chamonix, any climb when you have glaciated giants 3800m higher than valley is pretty nice.

[et-al]

Step foot into any climbing gym in the Bay Area, and at least 50% of the folks there are SWEs. Probably the same with improv groups. We're not that unique. ;)

[xur17]

I started getting into skiing a few years ago, and within the last year have started climbing. I seriously enjoy it, but how do you get over the constant fear of a permanent debilitating injury? I've mostly rationalized this away by doing everything I can do stay safe (equipment, partners, not pushing the limits too hard), and realizing that life is here to be lived, but still..

[saiya-jin]

If you do sport climbing with bolts drilled and glued in rock or in gyms, the chances of bad injury are super tiny, and sprained ankle would be the worst possible outcome. It never happened to me, and I overshot my level by mistake few times. The more you gain experience, the less the risk.

One thing that usually helps with fear is actually exposing yourself to it rather than avoiding it - you are afraid to fall. Find safe overhang (or vertical if unavailable) ie in gym, and just fall in it. Then fall again. Practice technique - push yourself from the wall with legs during fall, not too much just to avoid contact.

Its just like SIV course in paragliding - you learn about bad situations that can happen and how to handle them by getting into them on purpose (and then either managing them or throwing reserve, usually all done above lake for extra safety). This allows you to progress further faster and gain confidence in you and your wing.

At one point, its your choice - push things always to the max for whatever reason, or just enjoy good climb that can be challenging (or not) but not scary. Progress happens on both, usually a bit less on latter.

For me, I cut off all chasing for higher difficulties, if my skill drops I enjoy the challenge of trivial routes again. And even non-challenging climb is a very fine experience for me and that's enough (especially now).

Previously, I enjoyed actually overcoming of that ever-present fear as the best part of climbing, building character and shaping personality. I do honestly believe in it, I mean you expose yourself for 2-4 hours to acute (even if baseless, but your brain doesn't recognize it) fear of death, and you continuously overcome it to achieve your goal. If that doesn't teach you about yourself, nothing will.

[xur17]

> If you do sport climbing with bolts drilled and glued in rock or in gyms, the chances of bad injury are super tiny, and sprained ankle would be the worst possible outcome. It never happened to me, and I overshot my level by mistake few times. The more you gain experience, the less the risk.

I've just started to do sport climbing (like within the past 2 weeks), and my biggest fear is a screwup (equipment, amount of slack given out, belay device, etc) that results in me not getting caught. My mother likes to remind me that her friend's son was paralyzed from falling in a climbing gym (but unfortunately I do not have the details), which certainly doesn't help my fear. This fear isn't stopping me from doing anything, so to some extent I do think it's helpful / healthy since it's reminding me to be careful and limit my risks as much as possible.

That said, even just top rope climbing has significantly helped my fear of heights. Went hiking this past weekend, and I'm definitely more comfortable near cliff edges, etc (still fearful of falling, but not in a debilitating way).

> At one point, its your choice - push things always to the max for whatever reason, or just enjoy good climb that can be challenging (or not) but not scary. Progress happens on both, usually a bit less on latter.

This is a really good point, and something I do try and adjust for in both climbing and skiing. I like to improve, and push myself, but this is something I'd prefer to do for a long time, so I lean on the side of not pushing to hard and limiting risk whenever possible.