20 Jul The Saltwater Gospel: Surfing as Existential Rebellion
Let’s get one thing straight: surfing isn’t just a sport. It’s not just a hobby. It’s not your Sunday pilates class with a splash of SPF. Surfing is a full-contact spiritual practice disguised as a leisure activity for tan people with questionable income sources. It’s therapy without the couch, religion without the dogma, and rebellion without the manifesto.
Surfing is the great unscheduled ritual for those who refuse to punch in on life’s corporate time clock. It’s a middle finger to calendars, concrete, and conversations that begin with “so what do you do?” Surfing doesn’t care what you do. Surfing cares if you show up. With reverence, not ego. With waxed board and open chest cavity.
Because to surf is to voluntarily throw yourself into something far bigger than yourself, and then try to dance on top of it. It’s absurd. It’s romantic. It’s occasionally humiliating. And it’s absolutely the point.
The Meaning We Carve Into the Wave
We don’t just ride waves. We assign meaning to them. Every takeoff is a choice: to drop in rather than back out, to commit to timing over control. Every paddle-out is a sermon in resistance, every duck dive an invocation of surrender. The ocean doesn’t care about your credit score, your follower count, or your latest existential crisis. It cares that you show up humble.
Surfers chase water walls like some people chase God. But instead of pews, we sit in lineups. Instead of hymns, we have the chaotic chorus of crashing sets and primal hoots. Some call it adrenaline. But let’s be honest.. It’s a cleansing. A reset. Saltwater baptism with no priest, just a salty shuffle back to shore and maybe a cramp in your left toe.
Motivation? Madness.
Why do we do it? Why wake up before dawn, eyes half-shut, feet finding sand or sidewalk with the stubborn will of someone chasing something sacred? Why trade warm beds for salty skin and the unknown? Because when it’s good, when the waves line up like a cosmic rhythm section and your board becomes an extension of your breath, it feels like the universe gave you a secret handshake. That kind of feeling doesn’t come from scrolling, shopping, or sipping anything with a tiny umbrella in it.
Some say it’s an escape. They’re wrong. Escapes have clear exits. Surfing offers no such certainty. It’s a flirtation with the unpredictable, a dance with the ocean’s mood swings. You don’t show up for guarantees. You show up for the chance. And that’s where it turns existential. The wave you’re chasing might never rise. But the paddle out, that quiet defiance, that salt-stung hope, is the triumph.
In a world of algorithms and optimization, surfing teaches devotion to chaos. It asks you to feel again, not filter. It dares you to not know. And for those of us addicted to certainty, this is both horrifying and necessary.
The Ethos: Respect the Dance
The true soul of surfing isn’t found in contests or carbon-fiber board tech. It’s not in your pop-up or your surf check selfies. It’s in the unspoken code: respect the ocean, respect the locals, and don’t be a kook.. on the wave or in life.
The best surfers aren’t the flashiest. They’re the most attuned. The ones who know when to paddle, when to yield, and when to just sit and watch the damn sunrise. Surfing is jazz with water. You don’t dominate the wave, you find your place in its music.
And let’s be real, if you’re not wiping out, you’re not learning. Surfing keeps you humble. One moment you’re the sea-god incarnate, carving glorious lines with the grace of Neptune’s niece. Next wave: nose dive, underwater cartwheel, fin up your ass. Your trident’s in the sand, sea god. Welcome back to earth.
Surfing Is an Existential Rebellion
To surf is to say: I will not be ruled by clocks, codes, or curated personas.
To surf is to remember: I am still wild.
It’s an unspoken vow that sensation is sacred, that timing is trust, and that sometimes, the point isn’t to win, but to feel.
Surfers are philosophers in boardshorts and rashguards. We chase liquid epiphanies and call it “just a session.” But deep down, we know, we’re seeking ourselves in the shapeshift of swell, finding silence in the noise, grace in the flail, rhythm in nature’s heartbeat.
So Where Do You Begin?
Begin in a place that asks nothing but your presence. Start where community and salt still matter more than clout. Like here: Wave House Surf Camp in Berawa, Bali … the kind of place where surf isn’t just taught, it’s felt. Where people remember that surfing isn’t a destination, it’s a direction: toward the present. Toward yourself. Toward that impossible, fleeting, glorious now.
And if all that sounds too poetic for you, just remember: it’s also a damn good excuse to wear boardshorts & bikinis year-round and call it “personal growth.”