By Edgar Chao in 2022.
September 10th 2019. The day I thought I had it all. I passed my level 3 snowboard along with my good friend Joe. “First try! I can’t believe it” my friend Claudia said. “You’re only 20 years old!” Edwin exclaimed. “Let me put you in contact so that you can work in California” Renski said. I jumped into the freezing lake Wakatipu and get my ears pierced the day after. Sorry mom. The highest of highs, I had all these new work opportunities ahead of me in Canada, California, China and Japan. Life was now a feast and boy was I feasting on life. I had the whole world ahead of me and life could not get any better than this. I joke to my friends back home that it was all downhill from here but little did I know.
Fast forward to shoulder season circa October 2019 and I had narrowed my options down to Canada and California. Make lots of money in Tahoe or immediately adopt a role as a trainer in Canada? I had yet to decide. I was at my local gym back home in Hong Kong doing a side plank bang there goes my shoulder. In a blink of an eye I was put under the chopping board and underwent surgery and was put in a sling for 8 weeks. Well I went from either slashing pow in Canada or soaking up the sun in California to a whole lot of learning to do everything with my switch hand. Brushing my teeth, using the toilet, tying my hair up, everything. I was looking at 6-9 month of rehab and my northern hemisphere season was long gong. That was no fuss though I thought, I will make it just in time for the next New Zealand winter season and I will be ripping it up soon enough.
Fast forward again to March 2020 and I was back at the gym learning to raise my robot arm above my head while New Zealand announced that their borders are shut for the foreseeable future from something called the coronavirus? There goes another winter and the money I had spent to get my visa (I would still like that money back by the way INZ). I went from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows of my young adult life. It seemed like it was only yesterday that I jumped into Lake Wakatipu with all the Coronet Peak snowboard crew were cheering me on, taking videos, laughing at my high pitched squeal in response to the bone-chilling cold water.
Hong Kong goes into a self imposed lockdown and I went from snowboarding 6 hours a day in New Zealand to staying home lifting my arm up and down a handful of times and calling it a day. I slept twelve hours a day and took a nap right after lunch or brunch, whatever you want to call it almost everyday. “The worst part of my job is not being able to do it.” I tell my new found therapist over this app I’ve never used before called “zoom”. He asked me in his ever so soothing voice “on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the most distress ever imaginable and 1 being the least amount of distress, what number are you feeling?” “A strong 7, maybe a light 8” I responded. “And where are you feeling this in your body?” he replied. “mostly in my stomach and my chest.” I responded. “I want you to try something and bear with me on this. Close your eyes and take 3 deep breaths. Really feel the air fill up your lungs, your tummy and ribcage expand and slowly exhale. One… Two… Three… Good… cross your arms over your chest, similar to an Egyptian mummy and put your palms on your opposite shoulder and just start tapping either side one side after the other slowly. One… Two… Three… Four… One… Two… Three… Four… Now I want you to think about the happiest place you’ve ever been while you’re doing this. What does it look like? Smell like? What are some of the textures you can feel? What colors are the walls? Is there anyone there with you? Can you recall any conversations?” My
therapist said. I was immediately transported to the decrepit house I lived in while I worked in Niseko called Jagaimo. The Japanese word for potato. They say your first season is always your best season and that potato house was the epitome of it. The house and the 20 other people that lived in it. I imagined walking up the snow filled stairs in my thousand yen gum boots to be greeted by Goose and Chris who were having a smoke by the front door. I took my gum boots off only to be welcomed by the golden retriever of a person Sean in his very english accent exclaiming “You alright dude?!” I remembered it all. The four couches that surrounded the fireplace that didn’t work which we all unanimously repurposed as our Christmas tree, with all our secret Santa gifts yet to be opened under the fireplace. The wooden walls. The Christmas decorations on the windows. The wall of heat as soon as you entered the living room. The smell of Lizzy making mushroom soup. The 5 boys who lived in the ever so cold basement hanging out by the couches and Jasper already passed out in his “going out” flared white pants, hair all braided up. That strong 7 light 8 that I was feeling in my stomach and chest was gone.
What my therapist took me through was his version of emotional freedom tapping or EFT. It is a technique that I have taken with me all over the world personally and have used to some success for especially anxious trainees going into their certification exam process, or dropping into a feature trying a trick for the first time. With snowboarding being a board sport and us snowboarders being surrounded by nature constantly, I believe that it is only intuitive that we learn to be more in touch with our bodies and be grounded. This technique very fluidly ties into the idea of “comfort, confidence and commitment” and the middle tiers of mallow’s hierarchy of needs (mainly self esteem) and is effective in mitigating distress in the nervous system while increasing, comfort, confidence and self esteem. Only with a healthy mind free of stress can we unlock our full potential and I believe it is important to introduce techniques like this to help people grow.