
POINT TO PONDER
“There's something just as inevitable as death. And that's life.
Think of the power of the universe — turning the Earth, growing the trees.
That's the same power within you — if you'll only have the courage and the will to use it.”
-Charlie Chaplin: “My Autobiography”
STORY LINE by Rajiv Shah
I was vacationing in Mexico not too long ago and while I was there I went bodysurfing for the first time. No board was involved in this type of wave riding, just pure technique, throwing your body into a wave at the right moment in the hopes of catching it and riding it all the way into the shore. Or at least, that's what I thought.
It turns out there is more to it than that. As I was trying to catch wave after wave, most passing right under me or slamming me into the sand, another traveler called out to me:
"Can you feel what the wave is doing?"
I didn't know what he meant and shrugged. I tried to catch the next one - I got slammed again.
"That's your problem, you're not tuned into what the wave is giving you."
It was like a cherubic, sunburnt Bodhi had stepped out from Point Break trying to impart dimestore surfer wisdom to me.
"What's the wave giving me," I asked.
"Everything man. You're just too busy trying to catch it, you gotta let it come to you, take you. You don't ride it man, you just go with it. But for now, keep your feet up if you're lucky enough to rise into the wave."
A set was coming in and I began to paddle ahead of the wave. It was strong and I let my feet drift upwards like Chubby Bodhi said, and I let go... The wave picked me up and for a moment I was scared, I wanted to put my feet down in the sand, I wasn't sure where this was going - if I'd get pounded face first into the sand and break my neck, if my feet were high enough, or if I was really in the wave at all - but I could feel its power under my body. I was being pushed, water slapping me in the face, the tide pulling at my shorts, but I let it take me.
And before I knew what happened - I was on the shore, whitewater receding behind me. I looked back and realized I had rode the wave all the way in. Chubby Bodhi gave me a thumbs up.
REFLECTION
When I got out of the water I thought about why surfers are such a loose bunch (not always but from all the Spicoli stereotypes it seems that's what I've come to know of them) and came to the understanding that they are trying to tap into an energy larger than themselves - an energy communicated through the ocean, the earth - that you can't control. A wave will come when it wants at whatever force it wants, and all you can do is listen to it and become a part of it, sharing that energy with yours for those moments.
Then I realized living life is much like the way people catch waves: either we fight and try to force what we want on it, or we give over, listen to what it is giving us and we take the ride, letting it take us as far as we can go. Giving over, listening, and coming together with a force larger than your own - now that's power.