How Strong Is Your Will to Live?

A Survival Story on Mindfulness, Nature & Becoming the Mindful Trainer

Melanie Webb (00:07)

Welcome to The Mindful Trainer Podcast.

I’m your host, Melanie Webb.

This episode is a little different. We’re in between seasons—between what was and what’s coming next—and I wanted to take a moment to mark that threshold.

Before Season Two begins, before the conversations deepen and the terrain gets steeper, I want to share something foundational.

This is a story I wrote and published in 2011. Long before podcasts, long before platforms—back when I was simply trying to understand what it means to survive, to pay attention, and to trust yourself when things go sideways.

If you’re new here, this episode will give you a clear sense of who I am and what shapes the way I think, train, and ask questions.

And if you’ve been listening for a while, consider this an invitation—to step a little further into the landscape that formed me.

This is Slot Canyon Body Slam.

Welcome to The Mindful Trainer. I’m your host, Melanie Webb, and I’m recording this episode. It’s the first week of January, lots of talk happening in the studio between my clients and I about New Year’s fitness resolutions and how we want to approach the next year. And ultimately we’ve decided that we’re going to take the next month, between the Western New Year’s of January one and the Chinese calendar of February 25th to sort that out.

We’re all on different trajectories at any given time and any given day, one body is experiencing one thing and someone else is experiencing something totally different. So rather than subject ourselves to these arbitrary dates, we’re going to flex a little bit and we’re going to give ourselves some room to expand.

As I look toward the year ahead, I’m also contemplating the year behind me and I’m preparing to record season two of The Mindful Trainer Podcast. I came into this last year thinking, okay, I’ve been thinking about doing a podcast for a little while. Why don’t I just jump in and try it?

That turned into 20 episodes of season one, The Mindful Trainer. That was 20 weeks of publishing a podcast and I had no idea that I would do that. I came into it thinking I would do 10 before I started to release them. And then, I learned and I grew and kept going. And before I knew it, we were at episode 20 at the end of the year.

So as we move forward, I’ve decided I want to do this some more. I’m checking in with my whys and my values and one of those whys of course, which I’ve shared on the podcast before is that I really wanted to connect with some of my peers and colleagues in a different way. I wanted to create something that lasts longer than a quick five second social media sound bite that may or may not get seen.

And I wanted to give my clients something they could really sink their teeth into when they’re not just with me, but something they can perhaps spark an interest that they can chase somewhere else. I also wanted to reach new listeners like you, whoever you are, wherever you are. I want to thank you for listening and supporting The Mindful Trainer. It’s been an important part of my business growth in 2025, and I look forward to carrying it forward in 2026.

So we’re in production for the next couple of weeks with some exciting new episodes coming up. We’re going to lean a little bit into my roots as an adventure travel guide. Of course, this was always going on simultaneously while I was training my clients in the studio. Or if I took a sabbatical from training in the studio, was teaching small group classes.

I was writing and getting published with some of my short stories. I thought today I would share one of those with you to kind of give you an inside peek into who I am, what makes me tick, what makes me think I’m qualified to hang in the conversations, not only of those of 2025, but some that are coming up in 2026 that are pretty darn cool. I think you’re going to be inspired.

Anyway, those of you who know me as a personal trainer, you may not know that side of me that is pretty competent and comfortable disappearing into the back country, especially when it comes to Southern Utah. Those are my family roots. That red dirt runs through my veins and it’s part of my DNA. And when I get in that environment, it’s like I can just integrate with it and be at one with it.

And that came also with a lot of time and hours spent studying in that space as a wildlife biologist. For my first three years after college, that’s what I did. I worked with native and endangered aquatic species like fishes and toads and believe it or not, an endangered snail. And it took me all the way from the western border of Utah on Nevada, along the southern border of Utah and Arizona, all the way over to the Colorado River on the east. It’s a massive piece of land with lots of wilderness that you can just get lost in.

I came to utterly love it. And years later, got my permits and had a company in Utah as an outfitter and guide, Sol Fitness Adventures, my, my baby, my business.

After seven years in DC, I eventually landed in Santa Barbara and I fell in love with the landscape there. I didn’t know a single soul when I first took a road trip up Highway 1; all I knew was that this was such a special ecosystem with Pacific Ocean to my left, the spectacular mountain range, the Santa Ynez, two miles inland on my right, creating this spectacular verdant ecosystem that was just bursting with life and it drew me in and I moved there. 

Survival Story

I want to share a story that I published in Carson Magazine in 2011.

So are you ready? I’m sharing for the first time in audio format, I’m going to read my own survival story, Slot Canyon Body Slam. Here goes.

When I met Aron Ralston, the man whose heroic misadventure in a Utah slot canyon is the basis for the movie 127 hours. It was in 2004 at an event for his book, Between a Rock and a Hard Place. As an experienced canyoneer and a professional guide to the slot canyons near Utah’s Zion National Park, I was spellbound by Ralston’s terrifying story. He had been trapped by a boulder and lost part of one arm through self-amputation in just the kind of place that I explored all the time.

The questions posed by his movie 127 Hours are the same ones I started asking when I met Ralston seven years prior. How strong is your will to live? And do you have what it takes to be a survivor? Leaving the theater after seeing the movie in Santa Barbara in 2011, my thoughts plunged back to a recent close call. And in the process, my personal answers to those daunting questions became clear.

You know, being trapped by a boulder is far from the only way to get in trouble out there. Sudden rainstorms and flash flooding can be just as dangerous. A native of Utah, I was no stranger to desert storms. I’d witnessed my first flash flood as an eight-year-old on a family camping trip to southern Utah’s Snow Canyon.

My siblings and I were sleeping soundly in the tent above a desert ravine when a terrible thunderstorm struck, creating a torrential river where before there was only dry sand and rock. My dad, a biologist himself, coaxed me out from the tent in the dark, led me to a safe vantage point, and let me witness the trundling boulders and enormous tree trunks breaking against each other below.

In those terrifying moments, he planted in my heart a deep-seated respect for the power of Mother Nature, one that would bring me overwhelming joy and would also save my life many years later. The summer of 2009 marked my full-time return to the Southwest. Seven years of living on the East Coast had left me aching for the red, earthy hues of home.

The great American writer Wallace Stegner in his defense of the stark beauty that is the West, wrote, you have to get over the color green. I, on the other hand, could never get over the color red. What better way to celebrate being back where I belonged than to spend a month exploring my Zion stomping grounds?

One day, without a climbing partner and overcome with an irresistible need to seek out back country solitude, I decided to spend the day exploring by myself. I picked a familiar canyon and followed all the rules:

1. I told two friends where I was going and when I’d be back.
2. I bought my permit from the Zion backcountry office.
3. I set up my backcountry locator beacon to track where I was.
4. And I did what one always does when venturing into a slot canyon: I checked the weather report.

With a mere 20 % prediction of precipitation and nearly 150,000 acres to choose from, I figured I had nothing to worry about that day.

I set out early in the morning to crank out the 10-mile round trip, non-technical, lower route of the subway before the late afternoon storms typically rolled in. It was a beautiful day of clear blue skies and 100-degree temperatures, and I jumped and swam in the deep holes. I took pictures, I caught canyon tree frogs.

It was around mile four that dark clouds accumulated upstream. I recognized these clouds and I knew it meant rain. I just wasn’t sure how soon. Without anyone else to slow me down, I decided to pick up the pace and make a push for my destination. I reached the dark undulating tunnel of the subway proper with its deep pools and trickling waterfalls just as a strong wind blew in, carrying with it the unmistakable scent of rain.

Just then, a large clap of thunder echoed off the canyon walls. I felt my heart pound and my muscles tense. Without even pausing to think, I turned and ran full speed through the tunnel, making my way through the stream and up a sandy bank when another clap of thunder began, followed by another and another, a sound that would haunt me for the next 30 minutes.

The smell of rain turned to a downpour, and the dry ground became a muddy slick within minutes. I thrashed my way through willows trying to get as far downstream as possible. I needed to get out of this narrow section of the canyon immediately. I criss-crossed the rocky creek carefully, running whenever I encountered solid ground.

It was in one of these sprints that I tripped over an exposed root and fell heavily in a face-first body slam to the rocky clay. Stunned, I slowly picked myself up. I realized that I was beginning to panic.

As I huddled under the safety of an enormous overhanging wall, I drank some water, took a few deep breaths, and I considered the seriousness of my situation. It was already raining hard. I still had four miles to go to reach the exit. And even if the pending flash flood wasn’t deadly, I could still easily be trapped here overnight.

In no mood to spend the night in the canyon, I mixed a high calorie energy drink. I took a few bites of a granola bar and continued down the slippery slope to the creek. The wisdom of a fellow canyoneer guide rang in my ears. When 100 % of the 20 % prediction of rain falls in your particular drainage, you do what you have to do to survive.

Somewhere under that controlled panic, I came to terms with my mortal condition. I was going to die. I was going to die, and shockingly, I was not afraid. My pleading prayers for deliverance turned to gratitude, and life had never had more meaning. It was time to make my move.

Suddenly, I felt dialed in.

I was acutely aware of everything: cold raindrops hitting my skin, the earthy aroma of sagebrush in the rain, and the coarse slippery mud under my hands as I clawed my way up the steep banks. I felt the individual thump of each heartbeat telling me exactly what pace would keep me from fatiguing too soon. Underfoot, hundreds of juvenile toads scrambled to avoid my crushing feet. “Southwestern toads,” I thought, unable to escape my training as a wildlife biologist, even now.

The four miles of river that took me three hours to hike up took less than an hour to run down. I made it to the exit route and found a nice high spot to sit. I refilled and treated my bottles while the river was still clear and stretched as I felt the adrenaline rush wear off and the fatigue begin to set in.

It had stopped raining by now, nearly an hour passed before the clear running creek turned to a dark chocolate churn and rose by over two feet in the widest part of the canyon. I made it out safely with a wide-eyed grin of relief, reminding myself why I turn guests on my trips around at the first sign of rain. Travelers seeking an off-the-beaten-path Zion adventure with me may be aware of the risks, but they depend on me to show them the way.

Now, thanks to Danny Boyle’s wonderful film and the natural beauty that is southern Utah, I feel like my long period of self-doubt has ended. I know what it means to live and I have what it takes to have a survival story. Like Ralston, the canyons are where my mind has registered the most vivid moments imaginable. I’ve run with the river gods, spoken with Pachamama, and even glimpsed God himself. Perhaps I know what made Ralston do it after all.

Thanks for listening.

I wanted to share that story—not to dramatize danger, but to offer context. Because the questions that live underneath it are the same ones that guide my work today.

How do we stay present under pressure?
How do we regulate fear instead of letting it run the show?
And how do we prepare—mentally, physically, emotionally—for moments we can’t predict?

As I step into Season Two of The Mindful Trainer, those questions will continue to surface—through conversations with guides, athletes, explorers, scientists, and thinkers who’ve spent time at the edge of their own limits.

Episodes like the one coming up with Dr. Jon Kedrowski are a natural extension of this curiosity—about endurance, preparation, leadership, and what it really means to be ready when conditions change.

If this story resonated with you, I’m glad you’re here.

Take a breath. Take what you need from it.
And I’ll see you in the next season.