I don't have a lot of pressure on myself to be successful. I'm more of an artist. I just try to make myself more a part of the most beautiful painting as possible. And enjoy it.

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.

I think everybody has a dream of flying at least once in their life. For me, it's been over and over a recurring dream. It's mostly that. That desire to be as free as the birds, to be unhindered. I started off as - and am still - a free solo climber. So being in the air is a huge fear of mine. So there's a combination of going toward my fear as well as being fascinated with the air.

More and more people seem to be separating from nature. I'm trying to go in a different direction. I'm getting closer and closer.

For some reason, BASE jumping is misunderstood and our government forbids it and makes it illegal in most every place in the country. So I'm kind of a criminal here in the United States for pursuing the dream of flight, but everywhere else I go, every other country, I'm kind of looked up to, or fascinated with for the flying that I do.

Entranced by the flight of a raven, I watch its shadow move effortlessly against golden, shimmering granite. I long to be that free, flying above the cluttered world of normalcy, where so many are half alive.

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.