by Erich Sachs and Kim Brown

There is another type of mandatory time off that I think is worth acknowledging here. While taking time off due to injury or illness is a must, there are other times when we need to take a break. Times when the rest of our lives need our attention. I’m thinking of times when we are healthy, but something in our lives needs attention more than our sport does.

There will be days when not climbing is the right choice.

In 2015 my stepdad died unexpectedly. Kim took time off from school in Annapolis and I didn’t climb or train for the week we spent with our family, dealing with the realities of death and taking care of one another.

Later that year Kim had a miscarriage and we stopped everything again for a week or so. That was the week in 2015 when we posted on Mandatory Time Off. We turned entirely inward to deal with what was happening in our family. We took time off work, off climbing, off everything except ourselves and our most valuable relationships.

Those were big things for us, and taking time off to deal with them will seem obvious to a lot of you.

And some seasons when climbing will have to take a back seat to life.

But there are other times when life will very reasonably require you to walk away from or dramatically decrease your attention to climbing and training.

Something like having a kid and spending a season or a year or more focused on your family.

Or having a sick spouse or parent who makes unusual demands on your time.

Or really listening when your body or heart says you need to stop because you’re doing too much and pushing too hard.

These circumstances deserve to be treated seriously too. In the scheme of your life, these moments are short, but they are precious and once they pass they’re gone for good.

I hope that for most of you this is a no-brainer—when something utterly shit (or just unusually stressful) happens, let your focus shift. Deal with your life, your family, and your heart for a short while. Give yourself the space to feel your life and take care of what you might not want to do, but what you know you must do.

Thankfully, climbing and the incredible community that generally comes with it will be there to help you heal after the initial situation has passed.