Pictured above: USF St. Petersburg senior psychology major Ana Miranda urges students to try indoor rock climbing for both its physical and mental benefits.
Courtesy of Molly Ryan | The Crow’s Nest
By Aubrey Carr and Molly Ryan
For USF St. Petersburg student Ana Miranda, it’s not about how fast she gets there or what’s waiting on the other side. It’s all about the climb – the rock climb, that is.
Miranda, a senior psychology major, uses climbing as an outlet for daily stressors.
“It’s one of my major coping mechanisms,” Miranda said. “I can tell when I need to be climbing more because I will get stressed out, it’s just such a release.”
Though she has climbed for most of her life, Miranda started “taking it seriously” two years ago at her resident indoor climbing gym, Vertical Ventures in St. Petersburg. Now, she typically climbs five days a week.
“Since Vertical Ventures is the only climbing gym in the Tampa Bay area, the climbing community in St. Pete is really rich,” Miranda said. “[Vertical Ventures is] such a positive environment and all of the staff are all extremely encouraging for everyone of all skill levels.”
With St. Petersburg’s culturally diverse population, according to Miranda, another thing that makes Vertical Ventures special is its ability to foster inclusivity.
“Vertical Ventures is extremely inclusive of everyone from any background,” Miranda said. “One of my favorite things about the gym is that they put pronouns and preferred name in your account.”
Miranda said she recommends the sport for anyone looking to let out stress in a supportive environment — and the climbing community offers just that.
“It’s not competitive. Everyone’s hyping each other up,” Miranda said. “So, you just get the benefit of everyone being there for you plus the stress outlet of the physical exertion.”
Miranda said that she was drawn to climbing, not only for its physical and mental advantages, but also for the sense of community that comes with the sport.
“I know that when I first started [college], I needed some community,” Miranda said. “Just being able to come here and have people that you know, and be like ‘hey how’ve you been?’ It’s just nice.”
COVID-19 impacted Miranda’s ability to access the gym — taking away an important outlet in her life.
“It was a rough time. The gym opened up slowly. Only a certain amount of people were [allowed] in,” Miranda said. “You were only allowed to be here once a week and I was used to climbing like five days a week prior to that.”
With facilities reopening and restrictions being lifted during the past year, Miranda could not be more pleased to return to the gym. “It feels so good. It’s like returning home,” she said.
Attending USF St. Petersburg was less of a choice and more of a given for Miranda. In addition to the campus’s proximity to Vertical Ventures, its tight-knit community and reputable psychology program made it the perfect fit.
Though she entered as a junior in college, coming from a small high school, Miranda was “terrified” of the scale of larger universities. However, those fears were assuaged a after visiting the waterfront campus.
“I came to tour St. Pete, and it felt so tranquil. And I was like, ‘This is it.’ So, it kind of chose me more in a way,” Miranda said.
Outside of climbing, Miranda enjoys helping others, a passion she fulfils through her social work internship with Washington D.C.’s Public Defender Service. There, Miranda works in the mental health division, where she serves as a case manager in criminal cases.
“I have one-on-one contact with the clients, I hear their stories and then transcribe everything into our database. It’s a little bit of a reality check, just because it’s so heavy,” she said.
Miranda turns to climbing when the stress of the job begins to weigh on her.
“Climbing has helped so much because I will come in [after dealing] with a horrible case [at work] and a really bad situation. I’ll just be like, ‘I’m going to climb a wall and pretend like all of this doesn’t exist,’” she said.
Now, approaching her final semester in college, Miranda will graduate at 19 and plans to pursue a doctorate in clinical psychology in hopes of someday working in the criminal justice system.
Through her academic pursuits, Miranda says she will continue to climb as much as she can.
“I couldn’t see me going through graduate school without climbing,” Miranda said. “It’s not even a question in my brain, it’s a given. Like, okay, you get into this school, where’s the closest gym?”
