How a leap of faith took me to new heights

All I could see was fear. Technically, the sight of the lake's surface rushing up at me from 100m below was surging through my pupils, whizzing along my optical nerves and registering in my brain as visual information. But it seemed like a remote unreality as I plummeted dozens of meters per second towards what seemed to be certain death. The instant I jumped, primordial terror overwhelmed and short-circuited all ken.

Even in the throes of raw dread, I was cogent enough to marvel at this paradox: While the surface of the lake was rapidly rushing up towards me, somehow, my freefall still seemed never-ending. But after an abbreviated eternity of pure panic, I had fallen to only a dozen meters from impact.

I felt I was nearly at the end of my rope when, suddenly, I felt the tug of the bungee-jumping harness fastened to my legs. The force of recoil whipped me a couple dozen meters upwards and sideways.

Sheer terror gave way to sheer jubilation as I rocketed skywards - still alive - and I celebrated my survival by attempting a twisting summersault at the apex of my rebound.

After a few aftershock bounces, I was left dangling by my trembling legs as a motorboat sped along the lake to retrieve me. Hanging there limpidly, I felt great empathy for the shock a freshly caught fish must feel while suspended from an angler's lines.

As a child, I had overcome acrophobia by climbing the tallest barbican of a Civil War fortress and forcing myself to stare down until I wasn't scared anymore.

That session of exposure therapy did the trick until I came to China in 2005 and encountered a particularly precipitous bluff at the Huanghuacheng section of the Great Wall. Suddenly, I was reeling with once-familiar feelings: My heart raced, the ground rushed up towards me, and some powerful, invisible force seemed to be pulling me over the edge.

Since my return to China in 2006, I often find myself crawling around mountains and gorges, or sitting in cable cars or the window seats of small planes.

So, when I was invited to join an expedition to Qinglongxia (Green Dragon Gorge) in the northern suburbs of Beijing, I declared I wouldn't bungee jump when I signed up. But I had secretly spent the previous weeks building up the courage to take the plunge.

The "cliff bounce" tower was located on the side of a bluff overlooking a reservoir. Accessing the tower required crossing the dam's crest, and en route, I made the mistake of peering over the rail on the side of the inundation area. This terrifying glance at the dam's toe several stories below made me revaluate my plans to jump.

Still, I hoped to face my fear of falling by diving into extreme exposure therapy headfirst. So, I bought the ticket, climbed to the top, strapped in and walked the plank before I could think about what I was doing.

And after taking my leap of faith, I walked back towards the bus and glimpsed over the edge of the drainage basin - and, to my delight, did so without fear.

(China Daily 11/22/2007 page20)