Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Sean Chuma. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Hi Sean, thanks for joining us today. Risking taking is a huge part of most people’s story but too often society overlooks those risks and only focuses on where you are today. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – it could be a big risk or a small one – but walk us through the backstory.
I suppose this is the best question for a guy like me. I take risks every day. I jump off of things, only to trust that a parachute will open and set me down safely on the ground. Why do I do this? I love the feeling of being in harmony with gravity. Don’t get me wrong, I would love anti gravity, but gravity is amazing because it is a very strong force that keeps us connected physically, and possibly in other ways, to our amazing planet. You don’t feel that attraction power so much when you are standing on the ground, but it is very apparent when you jump or fall off of something because you plummet toward the earth. We all know that the power can also be catastrophic, because when you reconnect with the earth the impact can destroy you. So, parachutes were invented to soften that reconnection to the earth. If they are used correctly you can jump off of things, enjoy the freefall and attraction power to the earth, and slow down before hitting the ground. Knowing this, makes and experience go from horrific to highly pleasant merely by education. I take this risk every day because I have dedicated most of my life to learning about parachutes and by developing my skill in flying them. If i were to just go depend on a parachute without the skill and education, I would raise the risk in doing that activity immensely. I have taken my time to test the waters and slowly progress in the sport turning the darkness into light. I take other risks as well but I try to use the same method as I do in Base jumping. I learn as much as I can and then I make a more informed decision to move forward with the risk, or not. I don’t just gamble, I learn, build skill, then move forward with what I know.
Sean, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I am a professional BASE jumper. That involves a few things. I teach people to base jump, I take people on tandem BASE jumps, and I occasionally do film jobs where they need someone with my expertise in order to create what they need. My school, where I teach people to jump is called I-D BASE. It stands for Interdimensional. I have been teaching for over 14 years. I started base jumping with a gymnastics background, which lead me into the field of aerials BASE. This is simply the act of doing flips while BASE Jumping. I have pretty good spacial awareness from gymnastics so I do lots of complex flips and maneuvers. I became an expert over time, and eventually people wanted to learn from me. I started teaching people and every year my class has become better and better because of my experience with both BASE and teaching it. My time in the sport helps me to have a zoomed out view of the whole sport so I can help people in the short and long term goals within the sport. I teach beginning to advanced BASE Jumping. I have over 8500 BASE jumps and over 4400 Skydives. I have taught over 500 people, always in groups of 5 or less. I teach mostly at the Perrine Bridge in Twin Falls, ID, but I also teach big wall BASE jumping and wingsuiting classes in Italy. I work hard and constantly work to improve myself and my teaching style. I focus on teaching people to manage risk and make wise decisions in each moment because just having skill without the ability to make wise decisions will more likely end in tragedy. It is a very serious sport and it takes patience and education in order to turn into a long term jumper.
My other job and business is Tandem BASE jumping. I take people, with no parachute experience, on Tandem BASE jumps. I own the original Tandem BASE jumping company. We were the first one to exist and were the only one for about 10 years. I have trained others and been a mentor for even more. I started the company in 2009 with two partners, Abbie Mashaal and Mark Kissner, who have since gone in their own successful directions in life. I have run it on my own for many years now. My interest from the beginning was to be able to show others a glimpse of the sport of BASE Jumping so that they too could see why we do what we do. It is just a taste, so we obviously keep safety as the top priority, rather than pushing limits with customers. Pushing limits makes a little sense if someone is jumping alone, but it makes no sense when a person is just trying to experience the beauty of BASE at a beginner level. I have taken over 1400 people on Tandem BASE jumps all over the world and off of all the different objects in the Acronym BASE. (Building, Antenna, Span, and Earth). I have taken 102 year old lady, several paraplegics, a Quadriplegic man, and a sweet lady with cerebral palsy. I did these jumps because these amazing passengers had a driving passion to do amazing things and I was just blessed to be part of their dreams. I do Tandem jumps every year at Bridge Day in West Virginia from the New River Gorge Bridge. I consider it one of the best Tandem Base jumps in the world because the whole experience of Bridge Day is unbeatable.
I take my jobs very seriously and approach everything with a high level of maturity in the sport. I understand the good and the bad side of my sport and this helps me to make wise decisions to keep things on the positive side. As a young jumper, you move forward in time pushing and pushing and if negative consequences don’t present themselves you just keep pushing harder because you just start to feel like they will never come, but they will if you push too hard. Once those come, you start to realize the reality of this world and you become mature. Your whole mindset shifts and you become more interested in keeping the experiences positive so that you can be around longer to enjoy the amazing things in life. Because of my experience in this sport people reach out to me for education, advice, my professional opinion, and even my skills for TV and movie production. I don’t have a huge social media presence, and now days you don’t even need to be an expert as long as you have the biggest instagram account, but I am deeply rooted into my BASE jump community and my sport.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
I have had a few injuries because of the high physical demand of my sport. Each time there is an injury, it is a huge fight to climb back to the top of the mountain I have ascended. At one point I nearly tore my leg off in a BASE jump accident. I tried to convince myself that It would heal on its own, but it was so swollen and painful, not to mention it didn’t work anymore, that I eventually go an MRI that showed extreme damage to several ligaments in the knee. I had to get a surgery that took 7 hours, followed by a recovery that took nearly a year. The pain after the surgery was enough to make me want to tap out, but that wasn’t an option so I had to endure. The daily PT was like taking care of a baby. It was a full time job and was exhausting. Little by little I kept moving forward. On most days I just wanted to stay in bed but I kept fighting to progress because I wanted to be able to do what I love to do. A short recovery is one thing, but when you are spending months and months just trying to get to where you can stand again, it becomes a mental challenge. You just run dry of energy and you slowly feel yourself giving up because you just don’t have it in you to move on. But you do have it in you, it is just that you have to actually create the fire and drive inside. It isn’t just there, you have to find a reason and inspiration to keep going. Eventually you hit the bottom and the good thing about the bottom is that you can just stay there and forever be, or you can realize that it isn’t where you want to be, and you push off and keep swimming through the murky water toward the light, just so you can get that fresh breath of air. Then, once you are back to the surface you feel really good about what you have done to re emerge and you know you can keep doing that because you have realized the infinite power within.
I have transformed my life over and over again with the struggles I have gone through. Once I make it through one struggle, I realize something else that is holding me back. I continue looking for things to improve upon myself and brick by brick I have built my temple. I don’t think it can happen over night. Life and existence is a slow process.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
When I was younger, I felt like someone would come along and make me successful. I always had these opportunities that came along where i depended on others to get me where I thought I wanted to go. I thought I would get money given to me and become wealthy because someone else told me that is what they were going to do, or I thought I would be successful because someone was going to give me a job in their successful company. I depended on other people’s dreams because I didn’t have my own. I ended up homeless for a long time, waiting for these things to happen, but they never did. They only dug me deeper into a hole. Depression, debt, and loneliness because no-one else understood my personal situation and I was completely unable to explain it to them. I was alone and living in my car for about a year when I finally gave up on others to make it to success. I didn’t just instantly become successful, I just had a small vision to become a good base jumper and to participate in my passion and to keep doing it because I love it. I built upon that and just kept going. Now my life and success has taken on many forms and gone in different directions. I know not to count on the dreams of others, I know I have to go out and do it myself. This doesn’t mean I don’t face failure and have hard times, but when I do, I grunt forward and try to learn the lesson from it.
Contact Info:
- Website: tandembase.com, seanchuma.com
- Instagram: @seanchuma
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/seanchuma
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sean-chuma-218aaa63
- Twitter: @chumasean
- Youtube: @seanchuma
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/tandem-base-jumping-twin-falls
Image Credits
Luanne Horting, Megan Hackett,