A Conversation With Becca Droz, Climbing Guide And Amazing Race Contestant
On finding her voice through beatboxing, creating spaciousness through meditation, and building community through climbing
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Becca Droz is a climbing instructor/coach/guide, community builder, and creative human with an infectious energy and adventurous spirit. Some of her forms of creative expression include beat boxing and free styling, writing, rock climbing, meditating, and bringing people together. She also creates portal experiences, which are cozy containers cultivating more intimate connections at festivals and other events that can be socially overwhelming. More on those later. Starting in 2016, Becca accomplished a lifelong dream of being a contestant in The Amazing Race, appearing in seasons Seasons 29 and 31. Paired with fellow adventurer, Floyd, they became known as “Team Fun.” Another one of her accomplishments was setting the women’s speed record on the Naked Edge in Eldorado Canyon in 2021. She’s currently working on a book about her experiences in the reality show, and in the meantime, she’s harnessing her wide range of talents to fuel her other work.
I met Becca back in Boulder, Colorado after I signed up for a women’s climbing circle through my gym. Not only did I learn climbing techniques, she also taught us how to use our minds as our most powerful muscle. It was a joy to dig into some of those mindfulness topics in this interview, where she also shares about steps to building portals, valuing and prioritizing creativity, little rituals before getting into a spacious mindset, and her decision process behind committing to her next projects.
Why is creativity important to you?
I feel like being creative is just necessary to being human. While we can all have certain similarities and certain differences, there’s a uniqueness to how someone is creative. How someone develops their own creativity is a form of self expression. That feels like a special thing to hold to.
What gifts have you developed to stand out?
I thought it was really sweet at the end of last class when I brought up feelings of insecurity and inadequacy. My students were all very reassuring, and they pointed out how I approach climbing through a much more holistic lens. It involves the social, emotional, spiritual, physical, and mindfulness components. I try to create the transferability of “from the wall to life” concept. We’re not in the weight room learning how to lift weights. There’s more of a mental fitness to it.
What creative buckets do those different projects fill for you?
I’m an Enneagram 7, which is the Enthusiast, someone who is the Jill of all trades and master of none. I’m someone who just wants to optimize experience and have as many experiences as possible. But on the Enneagram chart, when the 7 is in a growth stage, 7 goes to 5, which is the Researcher. That’s more of the introverted homebody working on personal projects. My partner, Nikki, is a 5 so I’ve learned a lot from her. Working on portals and writing are me in my 5. Building community and community engagement are me in my 7.
For my birthday this year, I got myself an in-depth astrology reading. Part of that was trying to understand my purpose on this planet in this time. In preparation for my reading, I learned that there’s these things called the north and south nodes, which aren’t really as known in basic astrology understanding. They actually seem to be some of the most relevant concepts. The south node is basically what you’re already good at. The north node is what you’re moving toward. For me, my south node is in Leo, which is Team Fun energy. Fiery, positive, always having a good time. What I’m moving toward is Aquarius, which is philosophy, spirituality, and community. Essentially what I’m trying to do is create community through climbing. I can feel the hunger of people to feel connected. I’m still like, am I creating this community for me or am I creating this community for others? And what is my role in the community that I’m trying to create?
Where do you look for creativity?
Maria Popova’s blog, podcasts, free styling and jamming with friends, being outside, and cannabis. I’ve been trying to do more meditation and visualization. I work with a therapist, and I’ll express when something feels like spirit and something feels like imagination. And she’s like, well is there a difference? Spirit and imagination have a lot in common. I just find that to be a really interesting concept because sometimes in meditations, I’m no longer deciding what’s happening. It’s like my imagination takes liberty. It takes some time and loosening to get there.
Do you have any rituals for getting into a loose, open space?
I romanticize drinking coffee and writing. So I try and do that but if it’s not coffee then Nikki, my partner, has this spice blend company. I’ll make one of her spice blends, which are super yum. Creating spaciousness within me through some form of mediation practice really helps.
What does that look like?
I usually go inside the portal, which is in my basement. I’ll put on either some kind of meditation audio and a timer or I’ll do a more guided meditation. As far as writing goes, gosh, it just feels like I have to have hours to figure out how to get there. It’s just dancing around the moment of doing. All writers talk about how hard it is to show up so I know it’s not unique to me. But it is just funny how it works. Sometimes I’m like, I should use physical activity first so that my body is chilled out. My ideal vision is I wake up, do a tai chi move for six minutes and then maybe a little bit of extra stretching, I spend 10 to 20 minutes meditating, make some breakfast and coffee, and then show up to write. It happens sometimes. Sometimes I’ll also pull a tarot card just to give me something to orient towards.
Tell me about portals. How did the first come to be?
The initial portal was lights taped to a box fan. It was a representation of being able to give energy and receive energy, which is very different from today’s enclosed spaces. I think it evolved when a friend was creating nature portals at a music festival while I was creating the ideas for mine. We helped influence and inspire each other to create a little enclosed spaces. I reached out to TreePod, a Boulder company that makes tents you can hang from trees, and asked them if they would donate one to me. I turned it into what was the first official portal. I didn’t want it to hang from a tree. I just wanted to have the top suspended and it sit on the ground. So I built this pyramid shape.
I brought the first portal to a Creeksgiving party a friend of mine organized. It was the first time it had ever been at an event. It was just a very affirming experience. Different versions of portals have now been at multiple party events. It serves as a really wonderful contrast in a setting like that because parties can be really socially overwhelming, especially if substances like psychedelics or MDMA are involved. It can be really hard to connect with people in such open space. So the portal provided this space for a much closer, more intimate connective space. Almost every time, people go inside the portal, and they have a process of some sorts. Sometimes super deep emotional healing, sometimes playful vocal jams, sometimes eye gazing, sometimes who knows what. Then they exit and go straight to the dance floor to move all the energy that just occurred inside that small, sacred, container space. I think of the container as a masculine box for which the feminine expression of imagination, creativity, healing, whatever it is can occur.
What role has beatboxing played in your life?
So much of my creativity is influenced and inspired by the Two of Wands tarot card. My interpretation is you need someone else to hold that other wand to help you create magic. My brother is a really good beatboxer and grew up making a lot of noises. I really looked up to him and started beatboxing in middle school. By high school, I didn’t really know what to do with myself at parties, which is probably one of the reasons I started portals. I would just walk around the party until I found someone who wanted to freestyle. It was a way of socializing and creating creative space. It was also a really empowering form of expression. People would be like, a girl who can do that? I’d be like yeah, I’m a boss. I would go to open mics in Pittsburgh, where I gained a lot of confidence. Sometimes I wouldn’t even make it into the venue because I would just freestyle out front the whole time. It was such a fun form of expression that brought me into full flow and felt so good. I could do it for hours. In college, I joined an acapella group after my brother encouraged me to find one. He had been a vocal percussionist in one. So I joined the all-women’s a capella group at University of Colorado—Boulder, which was a super wonderful experience. I learned a lot. Through that and other friends, we would teach each other sounds that we had.
I have a special connection with anyone who is willing to freestyle, whether it’s rap or vocal jams, because I know that I can interact with them in a way that’s creating something from nothing. Something that will never be created again and has never been created before and is unique to that moment. I used to get really pissed when people told me they couldn’t do that. Now I kind of get it. My partner doesn’t freestyle, but she talks in accents and sings little diddies. That’s her version of free styling or making something up in the moment. It doesn’t have to sound like a rapper. The concept of finding our voice, especially as women, is a very alive concept for a lot of people. Creating vocal jams and being the rhythm provides opportunity for people to find and use their voice. Some people are like, I never knew my voice could do that before! It’s so cool to be part of that creative space.
You talked to me about starting your own newsletter one day. What gets you to commit to something? What’s the thinking that goes into a project?
I’m definitely an ideas person. So many of them are very doable and accessible, like starting a podcast or a newsletter or something. There are certain times I have really intense feeling inside of me. It’s like a somatic feeling of intense excitement or almost like an urgency to create as quickly as possible. Either someone else is going to create it first or I’m not going to create it in time for the people who need it now. I’ve gotten better at taking my time. Otherwise I create unreasonable goals for myself.
It takes a lot for me to commit. It takes my own idea, but I am influenced by the reassurance of others saying it’s a good idea. I can be self conscious around how weird my nature draws me to go. I brought my didgeridoo into class the other day, as per request by one of the students. It feels so vulnerable and weird, but then everyone loved it. We got so much out of it because we’re all craving spiritual connection, community connection, self expression. People see that and are drawn to it. That affirms me continuing to work on that stuff. Things like the portals and writing this Amazing Race book have felt like bigger priorities because they’re going to support everything else I do in my life. The long term vision is having a cafe community event space with Nikki. So everything she’s doing and everything I’m doing are basically building toward that. That’s the dream everything else is fueling.
Before you go…
Bookmark: 99 things to do when you’re bored (The Daily Good)
Listen: Your insecurities aren’t what you think they are (WorkLife with Adam Grant)
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