FORT KNOX, KY. – Arms and legs wrapped around a wooden pole, Cadet Aisha Nurudin-Watley, Virginia Tech, held tight, looking down at her battle buddies cheering her on from below. About 20 feet up in the air, Nurudin-Watley yelled that she was scared. 

She and the rest of the Cadets assigned to 2nd Regiment, Basic Camp faced the high ropes course. They had to navigate their way through a series of ropes, strung in different ways, at varying heights in the air. Then, they had to climb a tower by traversing different cargo nets, ladders, rock walls and ropes. Nurudin-Watley was about halfway up the tower when she started to realize just how high up she was. 

“It’s kind of scary when you’re all alone, in your own mind up there, by yourself, trying to pull yourself up,” she said.

At the beginning of her climb, Nurudin-Watley was not feeling very nervous. She does not really dread heights. They don’t really bother her much and she already faced any fear of heights she had on the rappel tower, but this was not the same as the rappel tower.

“This is different because you don’t really have a lot to jump off of and balance on,” she said.

Nurudin-Watley chose to climb up a few different poles that had hand and foot holds, similar to rock climbing. Once she was at the end of one, she began to get nervous. She didn’t know where to go next and she then realized just how high up in the air she was.

“I was worried about falling,” she said. “I had to take a couple deep breaths to tell myself that I could trust my battle buddies to keep me alive.”

From the ground, Nurudin-Watley’s safety team, two of her battle buddies, cheered her on. They offered support and told Nurudin-Watley where she should go next. 

“No matter what, they’re (battle buddies) going to have your back,” Nurudin-Watley said. “They’re going to keep you in the air and keep you moving,”

Nurudin-Watley had to remind herself of that over and over again as she made her way up the tower. She had to remember to have faith in herself, her equipment and her battle buddies. Placing her trust in others is not something that comes easy to Nurudin-Watley. In the past, there were times when she relied on others and they let her down. 

“It kind of dimmed my trust in who you can and can’t trust,” she said, “who wants to see you succeed and who doesn’t.”

In high school, Nurudin-Watley was the President of her school’s future business leaders of America club. She thought that the organizer of the club supported her, but that was not true. Nurudin-Watley heard from her peers, and eventually the organizer themself, that the organizer did not support and was questioning her leadership. 

A similar incident happened when Nurudin-Watley was organizing an event in college. She put a lot of her time and hard work into planning for food, activities, transportation and the guest list. Nurudin-Watley was the primary leader for the event, but other people went behind her back and cancelled it without talking to her first. 

“They put their friends before the actual cause and foundation that I had put a lot of hard work into,” she said.

When she arrived at Basic Camp, Nurudin-Watley realized that her old way of going through life, skeptical of trusting others, was not going to work. It was not hard for her to change her mindset though because she recognized that everyone here truly wants to see you succeed. 

“The whole point of this,” she said, “is to rely on each other and rely on ourselves and just trust each other.”

On the high ropes course, Nurudin-Watley developed the ability to place her trust in others further. Without trusting the instructions her battle buddies on the ground were giving her, Nurudin-Watley would not have been able to make it all the way up the tower.