Haven't posted in a while. Profuse apologies. Expect a post about what I did/learned this summer shortly. In the meantime I hope you enjoy this one.
Three of my friends and I have walked over coals. Have you?
More than likely your answer lies somewhere in the realm of "no" to "of course not you bleeding idiot". This is because most sane people do not enjoy activities that put the meat sacks at the bottom of their legs in jeopardy. thankfully for you I am not a sane person, have done it and you get to read about it.
To avoid any confusion this was not some sort of team building exercise at a corporate retreat. There were no trained professions supervising. And there was no alcohol involved, probably for the best..
When I tell most people this story they ask two questions. First, how did it feel?
Hot.
Second, Why in the Sam Hell would you ever do something so frightening?
In the spirit of full disclosure we saw it done on Mythbusters and thought it looked cool. So we went out back. Started a fire. Let it die down to coals. Then raked the coals out into a flat path. Then walked, albeit rather briskly, over said coals
I have been mountain climbing, kayaking, rappelling, mountain biking, spelunking and even fell down the side of a Great Smoky Mountain (but that's another post). None of those activities are nearly as frightening as that first step onto the coals.
But after the first step the subsequent ones get easier, and those are the steps that really matter. The trick to walking over coals is just to keep moving. That way no one part of your foot is touching them long enough to get burned. The problem is when people get to scared they just stand on the coals and do get burned.
Which is a little like advertising. It's scary to do something new, like W+K's Old Spice stuff, but once you take the first step it gets far easier to try new cool stuff every time. If you go with safe every time taking little tip-toey steps towards the coals you are indoctrinating a culture of fear. And eventually you may be standing on the coals. But because you move at such a slow pace you're going to get burned.
From my perspective it's better to take the risks without fear than to be stuck at the fringes. But again I'm a crazy person.
I walked over coals.