How Skydiving Changed My Life: The Scariest and Best Thing
Can you still relate to the fear of skydiving? I find many skydivers I talk to are self-proclaimed thrill seekers and adrenaline junkies, and many of them say they are not afraid of jumping anymore. But fear is where skydiving begins. Fear is where my journey started—and maybe yours did, too.
I remember watching my mom sign up for her first tandem skydive in 2019. I was both excited for her and completely baffled. She is not an adrenaline junkie or major thrill seeker. But she did it anyway, stepping into the unknown with a kind of quiet courage that stuck with me. Little did I know that moment would set us both on a life-changing journey together.
Being a world traveler and adrenaline seeker myself, I have always said that the scariest thing I had ever done was canyoning down a series of 10-plus waterfalls in New Zealand. Jumping off waterfall after waterfall was way scarier than rock climbing over Lake Superior, bareback horseback riding in the ocean in Costa Rica, skiing down mountain faces in Montana, glacier hiking over volcanic fields in Iceland, mountain biking on the cliff edges in Peru or swimming with sharks in the Galapagos. Even when I did my first tandem skydive, it didn’t top the fear I held from canyoning.
That is, until I decided to do my first solo static-line jump—with my mom— in July of 2022.
I don’t know if it was the six-hour class that felt progressively scarier with each topic we learned, the malfunction videos, the hanging-harness drills, or being suited up in the plane. Maybe it was when that Cessna airplane door opened over the shores of Lake Wissota in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin. Or maybe it was climbing out onto the strut of the airplane as the wind tried its best to push me off. But getting to the point of letting go of that airplane was by far the most combined adrenaline rush and fear I had ever felt in my entire life.
Can you still remember your first jump and everything you felt before, during, and after it?
Experiencing that first solo jump—and the next three—with my mom are moments I will treasure forever. Despite many back-and-forths about almost quitting the sport while pursuing my A license, at some point in the process I realized that overcoming fear is the essence of skydiving. From that moment forward, I kept pushing through. Now, just over two years later, I have earned my coach rating, static-line instructor rating, a D license and a tandem instructor rating.
But bigger than any rating has been getting to experience so many firsts with my mom. She stopped at four jumps that summer in 2022, but came “out of skydiving retirement” to be my first official static-line student in early 2024. And to top all those firsts off, she was my very first tandem student when I recently completed my tandem instructor rating this past August.
That’s what makes the skydiving journey special. Skydiving is about fear, yes—but it’s also about connection. I know that having my mom by my side helped comfort me in times of uncertainty. Now, as an instructor, I have the honor of being that person for others taking their first jumps.
For those of us already in the sport and those considering it, I hope you get the chance to experience skydiving with someone you love. Those moments will last a lifetime. Overcoming fear is the sport, and it will change your life if you let it. No matter how far along you are in your skydiving journey, do your best to set yearly reminders to remember how momentous those first-jump experiences are. Sit with them and put yourself in your students’ shoes. With these reminders, I am continually humbled to be the one who gets to take someone on their first jump—it truly is the scariest and best thing you will ever do.
Alli Dahl D-43140
Crystal, Minnesota