There is a lot of different sports and passions out there, but there’s non-quite like surfing. When you get bit by the bug and realize that this is more than just a sport, cool image or a fun activity. Only when this sport becomes a way of living you will understand how much it gives to you in so many other aspects of life. We will share 5 of the most valuable lessons that surfing can teach us in life.
1. Get to action and take opportunities
No matter if you are a beginner in the foams or a local in the lineup, being out there surrounded by ocean and waves makes you realize that there is no other way than taking action and catching those opportunities known as waves coming your way. If you don’t have a dedicated teacher or a helpful mate in lineup pushing you in the waves or telling you what to do, you will not catch a wave without giving it all.
This might sound like an obvious wisdom but believe me it is easily forgotten. While being in the water there will always be someone in a better position or more determined than you if you don’t set your mind in giving it all when you see that set approaching in the back.
The same goes for taking your opportunities in life, and live with an attitude of giving it all. This can be applied to a job, travels, relationships and much more. Never settle for half-hearted solutions or efforts.
2. Make mistakes and humiliate yourself
When practicing a sport like surfing, humiliation and the ability to make fun of yourself is inevitable. You will never get better if you don’t go for those helpless nosedives or starfish falls of the board.
Even the best of the best have progressed by continuously trying the same maneuvers and repeatedly falling and learning by each mistake.
This means, there is no progression without mistakes.
And how similar isn’t this in your everyday life?
You will never get better if you don’t try, as well as you will never learn if you don’t fall.
If you had a hard time with this before, I can guarantee you surfing will help.
With the strive of getting better and progressing, mixed with having fun surrounded by friends, there is only one way to go, even if it means going for that hazardous nosedive.
3. Taking care of our earth
This is something that we could wish that would be integrated in everyone’s thinking being a surfer or not, but we are not really there yet.
As being a surfer you will be exposed to the devastation of our earth in a more direct way than many others.
Nobody wants to share the lineup with plastic bags,bottles and rubbish. The ocean gives us the opportunity to do the thing we love, meaning the last thing we want is for it to suffer.
This should not solely be the reason for a more sustainable thinking, but it can be a good start and yet another beautiful thing that comes from surfing, and should be applied in the everyday life.
Take care of our earth because that’s the most important thing we have. There are many ways you as an individual can reduce you footprints each day, and it definitely doesn’t take much effort.
4. Live simple and be happy
When the day surrounds around the tides and the swell. When you will have those hours in the water only thinking about now and right here. When you feel the adrenaline of that first wave, or the comfortable and relaxed feeling after a good surf.
This is when it can become easy to realize how much more simple life can be lived and lead.
This does not mean there is not more to life than surfing, this just means that it makes it so much easier to apply this mindset to the different aspects of your life.
Living simply and living in the now are the most cliché sayings of how to be happy, yet it can be the hardest ones to achieve.
Surfing is a good way to get started.
5. Get out of you comfort zone
Lastly but not least, you will never be able to surf or progress without getting out of your comfort zone.
Weather it is getting in the lineup for the first time, or trying that first air, they are both examples of putting yourself out there and getting uncomfortable. Nobody wants to feel uncomfortable, but it is the best thing you can do for yourself to progress. It can be about searching for waves in the remotest places, or tackling your fear in bigger waves, it is all worth it.