Climbing Elcat

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"I felt like, you know, I could be the one to do it," he says of free soloing Elcat. "It's just not that big of a, it's just not a problem." The first ascent takes some pressure off for people doing the second or third time around and helps them focus on what they're really trying to achieve in their climb. But realistically, there's so few people interested and so few people capable,. So it's kind of better in some ways.

In 2017, Alex Honnold did what even the world’s best rock climbers thought was impossible. He climbed to the top of El Capitan– a granite rock mountain more than 3,000 feet high– without a rope, harness, or net. His audacious feat was the subject of the Oscar-winning documentary “Free Solo,” and it left Adam Grant with some burning questions about what we can learn from his unique approach to managing fear. In this episode of ReThinking, another podcast in the TED Audio Collective, Alex opens up about how he regulates his emotions when he’s hanging on by just a few fingers, what still scares him, and how he stays motivated to pursue ambitious goals. For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/RWAG2. And for more conversations on how the world’s most interesting people think, follow ReThinking with Adam Grant wherever you're listening to this.