It's one of the most fundamental desires of man, of being free and flying unhindered, and it really seems to go a lot with our founding fathers' principles of freedom.

I'm a pretty wild guy and I live pretty close to nature - I've often lived in caves or on the edge of cliffs or in forests - so it's just second nature for me to tap into the movings of the weather and the world.

A lot of people confuse free climbing with free solo. Free climbing is when we use ropes, but we only make upward progress with our bodies.

It's kind of strange to be a free soloist when you know so much about flying, because I'm playing two opposite games, or practicing two polar opposite arts. One is the art of not falling. The other one is flying. With both those things spinning in my mind, there's a lot to process and it's pretty mind-boggling.

Each time I saw a cliff, I wondered whether I could free solo it. My life shaped itself around the understanding that falling means I die. To break the paradigm I had to empty out my essence, rummaging for fundamentals I thought were gone forever.

Every time I go out and do something, Hans panics and starts trying to beat me. He's like a dog humping your leg.

I have a strong feeling for it, and I think us as humans perceive all of that - the pressure change and the moon and the wind and whether a storm is moving in on us - if we just are close enough to nature.