On the top of my desk at home, tied to a desk lamp I keep a piece of silk rope from a parachute. The piece is there to remind me about my experience of going already 6 times since I was 9, 128 feet in the air, on a parachute, tied to a motorboat with a silk rope just like this one.

The first time -- It was really scary, probably from the shock of the open air heights: you are up there, you feel the wind slapping you in the face and from time to time changing directions, there is nothing around you, but it seems like the whole world has left you and forgot about you while just laying comfortable and safe somewhere down there. You worry about landing back to this seemingly safe world and hurting yourself. It is paralyzing, all you do is stare at that rope which is your only connection to basically EVERYTHING!

The second time was also scary, because you already know THAT “scary”! There was no element of surprise to numb the whole thing a bit, so you start to think that may be you can take control over things, and if you wave to the people on the boat or give them some sort of signal that you had enough – they will nicely bring you down and you won’t be afraid any more.
It was not the heights I was afraid of that much, I was afraid of falling.

I don’t remember if it was the third or the forth time when my mind, may be out of self preservation, got to the wise simplification of everything:
Look, whatever you do – you can’t go back, you are already in the air.
You can’t predict what’s going to happen either, all you can do is be brave and smart and follow what you already have learned.
The only thing that is left to do is to look around.

And so I did:
Wow, it is so beautiful! Look at the colors of the water!
I never knew that behind these hills there is a little village with this pretty old church out there. That’s interesting, may be we should check it out later.
Oh, the people on the boats are saying “hi” to me, let me wave back: “ Hey! Hello!”

There is so much to see, learn and enjoy, once you are not afraid, not holding to something troublesome from the past, and not being worried for the future because all you have to do in the future is use what you have learned, enjoyed and witnessed NOW.

This little experience gave me one of the most significant lessons in my life.
It simply taught me how to be happy with everything I do.
Now -- I am not afraid of heights, I am not afraid of falling.