Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat. Concentrating on keeping my breathing steady, I peered over the edge of the cliff and shuddered, conveniently remembering my deathly fear of heights. Why had I decided to jump off a cliff again?

Let’s back up a little. The summer of fourth grade had come around, and my family and I had traveled to Mexico, Cabo San Lucas to be exact. The weather was sweltering as the unforgivingly hot sun beat down on the dry, sandy ground. Not a single form of vegetation was to be seen for a good 10 miles, with only the occasional squawk heard from the few birds flying above. My sunscreen smeared face shone in the sunlight, highlighting my dark, nervous eyes, as my head once again snapped back up from looking down for the umpteenth time. We had joined a ziplining tour that included bungee jumping, which consisted of jumping off a cliff and plummeting hundreds of feet toward the ground. Easy, right? Wrong. When it came to heights, I was a first-class chicken, and it is scientifically proven that chickens are not very good at flying. I watched as some of the other group members willingly lept off the edge disappearing, their screams-either of joy or fright-lingering in the air. Knots began to form inside my already weak stomach. I glanced at my sister. Her dark black hair, similar to mine, was pulled up into a low ponytail, to accommodate the bulky helmets we wore for protection. She wore a simple Nike tee-shirt that read “Just Do It” , which seemed to be mocking my crumbling sense of adventure. She was the only one I knew in the tour group, since our parents had wisely decided that they were “too old” for the bungee jumping. Like myself, she too seemed a bit queasy, judging from her pale face.

After what seemed like no time, the tour guides called out for the next person. None of the remaining group members seemed eager to launch themselves off cliff, which nobody could blame them for, so I decided to be brave and volunteered myself. Cautiously, I stepped onto the platform, where I would jump off. My legs wobbled, as if I had just learned how to walk the day before. The guides had previously explained how I would unhook myself once I landed back on the ground, but it seemed that I had forgotten everything they had said. I walked to the edge, so close that if I took another step I would have slipped and fallen. Mentally preparing myself, I began to focus and breathe deeply for a couple more seconds. There was an internal war raging within myself, as my brain screamed “Just jump!” while my will to survive stubbornly protested against throwing myself off a cliff. In the end, my brain won out and before I knew it, I took one final breath, and then...I jumped.