The second type of slacklining favored by Ms. Yeh is highlining. Ms. Yeh will walk a taut line anchored hundreds of feet up between two cliffs. She has walked over crashing waves in San Luis Obispo, Calif., against the backdrop of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and with Hong Kong’s cityscape behind her, peeking behind fog. If your stomach flips watching it, know that she always highlines with other experienced slackliners while hooked to two safety lines. (She falls, a lot.)

To understand how she developed such a passion for aerial antics, we recently talked to Ms. Yeh in a video chat from her home in Los Angeles. The interview was edited for clarity and length.

How did you get into slacklining?

When I was 13, I saw it at my local rock-climbing gym in the Bay Area. One day I just saw someone doing tricklining, so they are basically bouncing up and down, and I was immediately like, ‘I have to do that.’ Then, next thing you know, I am training every single week all throughout high school. Within that first year, I think by the time I was 14, I was sponsored by the biggest slacklining company out there [Gibbon Slacklines, then Slackline Industries] and traveling the U.S. and the world and competing.

Children cycle through many different hobbies. How has slacklining held your attention for 11 years?

Growing up, I always did a lot of different sports. I skated, I snowboarded, I dove in high school, but I was always a jack-of-all-trades, master of none. But slacklining was one of those sports where it really taught me that any person can be good at anything, if they put the time into it.

When you’re looking at a slackline, it’s one piece of rope. And every single person who starts out slacklining can’t walk the slackline. I couldn’t even walk the slackline the first time I started. Then, within a couple months, I was able to walk it.

What is a common misperception that people have about slacklining?

That they don’t have balance and that they can’t try it. I don’t expect anyone to get on the line for the first time and be able to walk it, because there are these stabilizer muscles in your legs that you don’t really use for anything else other than a sport like slacklining. So when you put the time and effort into it, you’ll build up those muscles and you’ll be able to walk it.

Do you need a super strong core?

It’s a lot of upper body strength. My arms will actually get really, really tired. When I fall I have to climb up the leash and use these maneuvers to try to get back up on the line. And then core muscles, when you’re trying to balance.