Substitute dragons

The night after this longline struggle:

What excited me most, was this line having so much force and beeing so lively. It tried to shake me off of its back (damn successful!)

With my mind blurring between exhaustion and excitement I
had a vision of this ancient thing:

(Pict: Wikipedia)
(Actually this is a chinese one, but I think we had these in germany too .. )
(Note: I placed a picture of a long-line slackliner beside of it - you’ll see why, as you follow through!)

Here's a list (stunningly long, as I think) of statements that apply to long slacklines and dragons as well:

• It's a huge thing
• It can exist in various spots in nature. Even on mountains.
• It excites just by it's sight
• Most peoples are afraid of it. Heck - even you are! But you're opposing it anyway - so you feel brave!
• It tries to shake you off of it's back.
• It gets furious if you tackle it intensely.
• You are right of being afraid, because it can throw you off and wip you and actually hurt you!
• No matter if you’re afraid - thrown off, wiped or even hurt - you will try again! You are obsessed by this struggle!
• Men are stepping up one after another to challenge it. The more they fail the more precious the victory. The more it gets defeated the more it becomes a pet!
  
  

Some suggest that dragons have never existed, - arguing these mythical beings were just reflections of our inner fears. Long slacklines do the same thing!
They deliver a transformed insecurity feedback (so to speak) as the turbulences of it are just reflections of our own insecure momentum that we submit into it.

In both cases fears and insecurity gets amplified and transformed – and then become visible in the frightening turbulences of a slackline or our picturing / projection of the imaginary beast. Both enable us to face our imperfections - they expose it - so we can confront them.

For a great part of human evolution we personally grew with dragons as hiddenly self-reflexive challenges. In todays rationalized and unphysical world we’re missing them so much that we are creating ouselfes a similar self-reflexive challenge as a substitute.
A long slackline is a substitute dragon: We create it to subdue it!