what is the biggest risk you have ever taken?

[Summerstorm]

Hm, can't think about too much... i live pretty much risk-free (Well apart from the usual children play "throw the stone" or climb in the trees-stuff or making a mistake on the road)

The one thing i am doing now is buying an apartment for money i don't have. (So pretty much i got the bank to buy it for me)

I will be getting an insurance for it ASAP, and i calculated that i can make my loan-payments even from unemployment payments. But who knows. It's is still a lot of cash (i don't have) nearly half of what i earn (hate that word) for the next ten years... sigh.

 

[Trippy Turtle]

This post.

 

[Fractral]

snip

I had something similar happen, also in china. A group of us (18, so quite a lot) went from central Beijing out to see the great wall at Mu Tian Yu. I was supposed to be leading but fell asleep on the bus and was woken by someone dressed as a bus driver telling us to get off. Panicking a bit we all got off to discover that the guy wasn't actually a bus driver, and had made us get off several stops early so he and his friends could drive us the rest of the way. We argued a bit but eventually they split us into 5 different cars and drove us there. I have never been more sure that I was about to be murdered.
It turned out that they were just trying to fleece a bit of money from the stupid western tourists, rather than intending to kill us, but if they'd had more sinister intentions there would have been nothing we could do. We did have to tell them quite firmly that they weren't allowed to follow on the wall, so they waited for 5 hours at the bottom for us so they could take us back.
Naturally I was blamed for the entire thing.

 

[somersetsaxon]

Having open heart surgery at age five (so back in 1992) would probably be the biggest risk I've been exposed to. I'm not sure that it really counts as my parents are the one's who consented to the operation. However, in theory the condition would have been lethal by age 10 at the latest so I think it was probably worth it. Other than that, just low level risk stuff like driving in bad weather.

 

[Tiger King]

... Skydiving?

I dunno. You talk about moving, but I've done that a lot.
Travelled through asia staying in the places the locals did... But that was when I was a child. May actually have caused longterm health issues, thinking about it. I got violently ill in India when I was quite young, which can't have been good.

Not really my decision as such though. - My mum is the one who decided to do that. (And travel alone, with a young child through several muslim countries too... Some of which were... Troubled. Great idea... >_<)

I mean, there's lots of little things, but nothing much that really sticks with me.
I don't like taking obvious risks, but having said that I probably haven taken many in life.
much travelling. A few extreme sports. Questionable decisions around scary people...
Moving long-distance with next to no resources and little to fall back on...

Flying lessons... XD

Walking around by myself late at night (apparently that's dangerous if you're a girl?)

At this point I'm not really sure what I've done that is (or isn't) risky...

Done sky diving a few times, love it. The way your heart pounds before you jump and that massive instinct you have to fight that is telling you to stay in the plane. good stuff.

sounds you have led an exciting life, I love travelling myself and hope to do more one day.
I guess on the surface simply moving doesn't sound too risky but a lot of things I take for granted in my homeland will not be available to me right away such as health care. I'll have to retake my driving license which is gunna be a bit frustrating too but I've been told Americas driving tests are easy.
Obviously i'll not have my family or friends there to support me either if I get into a bit of a fix.

 

[Mr Companion]

Recently quit my job
I once gate crashed a business studies course in secondary school. Nobody noticed I wasn't supposed to be there until it was way too late. At the end they gave me a certificate for "bravery" as if to say 'We see what you did there cleverdick'

 

[babinro]

I'm not a risk taker.

The biggest risk I'm taking is probably doing what I do right now in terms of living my life. I'm deliberately living a life of poverty in favour of having more free time to simply have fun. What does this mean? Well I work part-time about 20 hours a week and live off less than 11,000 a year. I'm extremely poor but extremely happy. Been this way for a couple years now.

Probably a huge risk to my future.
Not exactly the excitement this thread was going for though

Do you ever get bored?
I finished working the notice for my job the other week and the first few days were ok, relaxing, getting up at midday etc, but after that I got restless.
Everyone is at work so I have nobody to talk to and all there really is to do is play on my computer.

Not really.

It comes down to personality. I've always been very independent and can easily find ways to spend my time in a manor that makes it feel 'worth it'. Granted, the vast majority of it is spent on my computer just like yours.

That said, some days are more eventful than others. If I feel like I'm wasting time in a bad way...I have the option to put in extra hours at work. I've done this on rare occasion typically a few times a year.

Your situation is not uncommon though as I've known quite a few people who would feel the same.

 

[Tiamattt]

Hm....one time I was waiting for a train, when a wall scroll one of my classmates asked me to get her fell out of my hands(no idea how) and onto the tracks. I could hear the train was close by, not rushing toward my stop but at the very least at the very next one. But I still jumped down to get the wall scroll and climbed back up with not as much time to spare as I would've liked. This is also one of the stupidest things I've ever done since the darn thing was $13 max and it wouldn't have taken me that much longer to go back to the store to get another one. But I was a dumb teen that was low on cash(although I think I should've had enough for a 2nd wall scroll) she was cute, and I was really lucky not to get killed.

 

[Rabbitboy]

When I was 7 I put a piece of copper wire in an electrical socket. It felt like someone slapped me on the back very hard.

On my bike I also used to take some risks in dealing with other traffic whenever I was in a hurry. After I started taking drivers lessons I stopped doing that (mostly).

 

[Happiness Assassin]

Lots of ATV stories. Racing a friend down a mountain (worked out fine), racing on a dirt road next to an irrigation canal (didn't work out fine), and seeing how many people can safely fit on one ATV (the answer is NOT 4).

 

[Phasmal]

I moved 500 miles to go live with a guy I met on World of Warcraft.

... Though that sounds a lot riskier than it actually was. I'd known boyfriend for some time, he'd visited me, I'd visited him, my parents had spoken to his parents over the phone to make sure neither of us were axe-murderers.
We just decided that a long distance relationship wouldn't work out so someone was gonna have to move and I decided it might as well be me. I'm kind of a `Home is where you hang your hat` type girl.

Good luck on your move, though.

 

[TechNoFear]

Once I walked right up to an old man threatening me with a rifle, until the muzzle was pressed against my chest.

We had a 5 minute conversation like that, until I convinced him to put the firearm down.

I was positive at the time he would not shoot me but afterwards I had no idea why...

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

In my high school days there was a tradition of bridge jumping during finals week. There's one bridge that's fairly high up and only has a narrow channel thats "safe" to jump into and either side of said channel is about 6-8 feet deep maximum. I'm notoriously scared of heights but I did it anyway, remembered to point the toes and lock arms at the side and only hit the deep channel by maybe a foot and a half. I could feel the wall racing by as I torpedoed downward and nearly panicked so bad I lost most of my air. Barely made it to the surface as it was and had a couple scraped from outcroppings of coral that tugged at my skin as I went down.
Scared the living hell out of me and probably the dumbest risk I've ever taken. I did quit worrying about my exams though, which was the whole point of the exercise and also turned out to be the only person to actually jump where everyone else chickenshitted out.
After that I did have a reputation of being batshit crazy, though in reality I didn't intend to jump until I was already on the other side of the retaining wall of the bridge and lost balance due to minor vertigo.
Was nice to have a minor rep going into my senior year that finally got most of the biggest jackasses in my school off my back for the year. It wasn't respect (and I didn't want theirs anyway) but it was nice to have anyway.

 

[MeatMachine]

Not sure; probably one of the following:

-Enlisted in the military with an excellent ASVAB score, but no predetermined job or even job catagory.
-Proposed to a woman who had minor spine cancer and kidney failure. She died two months later.
-Attempted suicide by jumping in front of a truck, failed. Then tried to overdose on medication. Failed again.
-Moved across the country to a very small, isolated town to escape from everyone and everything in my life.
-...currently trying to figure out what the hell I am going to do.

 

[f1r2a3n4k5]

I am saying this because I am moving to a new country within the next few days.

Good luck! My biggest risk is also in that category.

There's nothing quite looking back at it. Not 6 months ago, I moved 1,000 miles away from anyone I'd ever met with just some clothes.

And it's great to just get a cup of coffee. Sit back in my apartment and think... "How the hell did I get here?"

Not really a risk as much as an adventure.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Two times that I had crossed the road when a car was very nearby and got to the other side unscratched.

I'm pretty sure somewhere in the multiverse on the "what if", one version of me would had been in a hospital/ serious injured or died and the other version would had damaged his left upper arm (the car side mirror was very close to hitting my arm).

 

[sanquin]

Making my own cable track with makeshift stuff was one. Going 100 kilometers (about 62 miles) over the speed limit, not on a highway, and I was riding a motorcycle is another one I can think of. (It was awesome though!) Not sure which was the biggest risk.

 

[kasperbbs]

When i was 5 or 6, me and 3 of my friends came up with a 'game' of running back and forth through a busy street and eventually i got hit by a car, thanfully the guy stopped in time so i was well enough to just run off. Over the years 2 kids died on that street, only then i realised how lucky i was.
Then theres the loan for my appartment which i will be paying for 14,5 years which scares the crap out of me.