bungee jumping experience

A Story by Thomas Lucas

bungee jumping experience

Have you ever experienced a dream, where you were falling down and just a couple of seconds before touching the ground suddenly waking up feeling anxiety? it happened to me ... with one exception... I have never been nervous after such dream, only curious how free fall really felt like... And finally, this year I got to know the feeling.

All circumstances in my life lead me to bungee jump. Some friends of mine did it and posted incredible videos, people in my surrounding were talking about adrenaline activities, commercials of websites that provide a different kind of sports packages and adrenaline experience services started randomly appear on the pages and even on the street blackboards. I felt, the time has come, no excuses anymore, I gotta do it.

I'm such kind of person, who usually doesn't wait for anyone to visit new places, to travel, to take up new activities. As I'm impatient also I don't like to rely on other people, act by their plans. And I believe I can lose myself by putting aside my interests, or wait for xxx years by trying to organize it with someone.

However, I gave it a try and decided to ask if some of my friends were up to it, as it's such an unusual activity and it seemed more fun to share this kind of experience with someone. But most of the people I asked said: “no” or “I'm too beautiful to risk my life” .. some of them even accused me of being crazy and insane… funny….

Happily, one of my uni mates replied: “Hell yes, count me in”. You know, after getting so many rejections I thought in the beginning that he was joking. But he was serious. We purchased vouchers, booked the activity for the following week, bought bus tickets in advance. Every day we were getting more and more excited. I actually wish we had a tear-off countdown calendar to mark every day and have more fun getting closer to the bungee jumping day hehe. Nervous feeling approached us just on the way to that city, where bungee jumping took place. My friend started to be tense as there was no way back, me, i was concerned more about documents (you see I'm a student from non-EU country, but currently living in Europe, and in order to be here, I'm supposed to have a card, or stamp in the passport, however, as my documents are proceeding I had no documents on my hands, no confirmation about that. So if in some case police would have stopped me and asked to provide the ID, I could end up bad) so even knowing this risk, I still went for it. As one said:”Nothing ventured, nothing gained”!

We arrived at the city, to the final destination, the bridge. Registration went fast, we got the needed equipment, instructions and waited. it s well known how people deal with fear. There are various groups with different reactions. One of them is who doesn't take seriously currently happening situation and the only thing they do is laughing their asses off. And there is another one, who actually can't cope with the fear and their body gives them away - they shake, the voice trembles, they start to look chalky, because of poor blood circulation and they are so much in their minds that it's useless to talk to them. It turned out, that me and my friend, we belonged to these two totally distinctive groups. I was just jumping around, having the crazy smile on my face and awkward continuous laugh. Meanwhile, my friend was just looking around, feeling surprised and shocked of 62 height, as he imagined it a little bit differently. I feel sorry for the staff who worked there, as they had to witness such two characters.

My friend was first to jump. I saw the fear on his face, I bet he wished he had said no to me at the beginning. But now it was too late, he was already on the other side of the bridge. He let the bridge go, put his arms to the head and bending over he started to fall and pick up the speed. I heard him screaming the very next moment.

I was next. My condition was still the same, even when I was standing on the edge of the bridge. I was asked if I was ready, my response was brilliant:" I'm always ready" hehe I guess I watched too many action movies ... 3-2-1 jumped. Losing connection with everything that is solid, secure, and familiar, I was falling. Now seeing the ground coming closer and closer, I was scared. But the crazy feeling of freedom came next second. All the anxiety, nervousness disappeared in an instant. Enjoyment replaced fear. I yelled: WHOOOOOOO HOOOOOO!" I was just hanging there for a couple of minutes, enjoying the view, waiting to be pulled back to the bridge. When I was already on the ground, I couldn't help myself, but smiling. And it was the huge-a*s smile. You know that feeling when you can't hide your emotions, you can't control your muscles. That exactly what happened to me. We went back to the office to return the equipment, take our things. We were asked questions about our experience, I was hyped, super talkative, ready to explain everything. However, my friend was still kinda lost. We left the place after 10 minutes and headed back to the bus station to go back to Prague.

One of the reasons that I decided to post this text is to encourage people to step out from their comfort zone, to face their fears. I'm not talking only about bungee jumping right now, but other things too. Whatever you want to do, don't let your fear stop you. Turn it into courage. Just give it a shot! And step by step you will improve yourself, you will remove your psychological blocks!

I'll finish writing this story by one quote that I really like and I hope it all will make you think about your life and decide to do something new. “Everything you've ever wanted is on the other side of fear"