Margo Talbot Speaks About Addictions at TEDx

Current research suggests that addiction and depression are symptoms of emotional distress, not causes of it, forging the link between childhood trauma and mental illness.

Margo Talbot’s journey supports these studies. Diagnosed Bi Polar at age twenty-two, Margo spent the next fifteen-years in suicidal depression before discovering the healing power of presence as the antidote to emotional trauma. Being present to our thoughts and emotions, not running the other way or masking them. Where best to practice the art of presence than the frozen world of ice climbing.

Margo Talbot is a writer and climber who lives in Canmore, Alberta. She was the instigator and main contributor to the fourth edition of Waterfall Ice Climbs in the Canadian Rockies. As a climber, her favourite medium is ice and alpine, and she has accomplished many first ascents of waterfall ice in Canada.

She has competed in a number of climbing competitions, including the ESPN X-Games and the Ouray International Ice Festival.Her travels have taken her from the High Arctic to Antarctica, and the mountain ranges in between. Her goal is to visit the remaining wilderness of the planet while sharing her personal story with others, a story about reconnecting to life after spending decades in darkness. Her first book, All That Glitters: A Climber’s Journey through Addiction and Depression, chronicles this story.