Episode Intro:Welcome to episode 8 of the Female Guides Requested Podcast. I'm your host Ting Ting. Today's guest is Josie McKee. Josie is a bad ass climber and she has a booming business where she provides mindset coaching. I first met Josie in 2009. She was already a strong climber and she climbed boldly. Back then, she often captured the moments with her DSLR wherever she traveled. Her images were expressive. I enjoyed following her journeys through her lens. Josie has spent years in Yosemite. She worked for YOSAR, sent gnarly routes and went fast on big walls. I started to learn about her stories not only from her personal social accounts, but main stream climbing media. I knew in the past she guided some and I remembered she took her Rock Guide Course with scholarship. I thought she might become a full time guide, but then she surprised me again. Right now she lives in Lander, and has her own business called the Mind Athlete. She coaches people to harness stress and turn it into something beautiful for their own climbing. I think this job is perfect for her given her climbing reputation. But how did it all come together for her? And what exactly does she do? I invited her to be on this podcast to satisfy my curiosity, and to collect insights on alternative professions complementary to guiding. This interview was also quite special because I haven't chatted with her in the same room since more than a decade ago. Josie is doing amazing things and I'm happy to share with you all.

Show Notes:

Josie’s Links:

• Mind Athlete official website

• Josie’s Instagram

Timestamps:

00:00:00 – 00:04:25 – Josie was back to Las Vegas playing on big multipitch routes and Ting Ting scored an in-person interview. Josie has an amazing climbing resume, and they talked about Josie’s career path from early days to mindset coaching.

00:04:25 – 00:08:18 – Talking about Josie’s early nickname “hardcore” and why she had complicated feelings towards the nickname. As Josie’s climbing accomplishments grew, she felt pride as well pressure bring looked up to.

00:08:18 – 00:12:19 – Josie’s many pivots as she navigated in the rock industry. She started her climbing career working in a gym and then transitioned to outside guiding and then YOSAR and teaching skill courses and wilderness medicine.

00:12:19 – 00:22:16 – However the glorious and high stress days in Yosemite made Josie start to dread about climbing. She had to re-examine her relationship with climbing and started her journey towards mindset training and mindset coaching.

00:22:16 – 00:26:58 – Josie talked about her relationship with climbing and how she now is at a much happier place.

00:26:58 – 00:33:21 – Josie moved to Lander WY so she could spend most of her climbing time on fun sport climbing and adjusted the time spent on the big objectives to a managed level. She worked for the international climbers festival and developed and taught courses.

00:33:21 – 00:38:31 – In the meantime, she started coaching other climbers on mindset work. Due to pandemic, she also started working with clients online. Gradually it reached a critical mass that Josie now decided to work on mindset coaching full time.

To read more visit: https://femaleguidesrequested.com/podcast/ep-08-josie-mckee-the-mind-athlete/