Title: Maintaining Power

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Our proficiency with skills is not static, it diminishes or increases with practice. We maintain our power by continuing to practice skills each time we climb. With practice, skills become more known and familiar. We shift our knowledge of the skills to an intuitive level where we don’t have to think about them anymore. We simply execute them with quality. Doing this maintains our power.
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The general approach to practice is that it’s a burden instead of value added. We see it as an obligation instead of an integral part of our process. With this approach we aren’t motivated to practice.
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Practice, however, is the means. It’s the process that allows us to learn to deal with more stress. It’s what is most important to convert that stress into comfort so we can learn and enjoy climbing.
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I climbed Gilgamesh numerous times over multiple visits to practice all aspects of the process. On my eleventh visit I climbed through the first crux (the invert), the second crux (insecure jams), and into the third crux (off-width) before I fell. Why did I fall? Because I felt like I would send it this time. That thought distracted my attention, and therefore my power, causing me to place the #4 Camelot in the incorrect spot: where I place my last fist jams. So, practice also means practice for our minds. I needed more practice keeping attention on task, and let go of the desire to send.