r/climbing • u/umbraphile1724 • 13d ago

ego grades and mentality

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A coach came up with this concept of ego grades and how they relate to your climbing mentality, which he divides into fighters and dancers. I could relate to elements of both, but ultimately think I'm more of a fighter. hbu?
https://www.climbing.com/skills/technique/climb-better-archetypes/

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u/Nailed_plywood 13d ago edited 13d ago

As the author of the article, I hope anyone can take those mentioned grades and convert them into the grades they climb so that they can identify with the underlying concepts, rather than getting so focused on what my version of that looked like.

The article was my journey into self reflection about why I started to dislike aspects of climbing, and turns out (surprise surprise) as I devoted more and more of my life to a single pursuit, my ego started to naturally form around it in ways I couldn’t pin down. But of course, after years of coaching that came out as advice geared toward having fun and getting better, rather than just having fun.

My hopes by working with climbing mag was to spark some self reflection for a broader audience than I reach through face to face communication (even via a paywall)

But as it goes it seems I also gave the peanut gallery some ammunition 🤷

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u/atypic 13d ago

I relate, for sure. I am a PITA to be around when I fail in the ego zone. Learning to deal with it is ... rough.