Eileen Gu is only 18. Born and raised in California, Gu competes for her mother’s native China, where she hopes to win three gold medals: in halfpipe, slopestyle and big air.

Gu’s relationship to fear is evolving. She thinks about it a lot. She keeps a diary, and some of her handwritten entries, she said, are devoted to the subject of fear, in all its forms.

At the request of The New York Times, Gu wrote down her thoughts on fear — how she views it, how she manages it, how she hopes to conquer it. Read More