For as long as I can remember I have always loved the water. I have been privileged enough to spend my whole life by the coast. Winters in California and summers on the east coast in the Outer Banks. After graduating high school and the mess of figuring out where I wanted to go to college began, I knew one thing, I had to go to school near the beach. I think most California kids can relate to that too. I am glad to say that I attend school in North Carolina where I live minutes from the water and am in the water more than I could have imagined. I started surfing around age 10. Anyone who surfs remembers their first wave.

Since then I surfed whenever I could. However, as the years went by there would be times when I would stop surfing for a while and pick it back up a few months later. I found myself refraining from surfing because of my own judgments and others. Throughout high school I would worry that I wasn't good enough, and since I wasn't good enough, why should I be embarrassing myself by trying to do it? From a young age, I felt I was average at most things, school, sports, and the hobbies I had. I was good but never actually good enough. Something that I realized recently is that it’s okay to not be the best at everything or really anything at all. Surfing was something that taught me this. I always felt I had to keep getting better and I had to be really good at surfing for it to be fun or for me to enjoy it, but in reality, I did not.

If something brings you joy, then it should not matter if you are the best. As humans, we put so much pressure on ourselves, which of course is due partly (maybe fully) to social media. The internet makes us feel like if our life isn’t going to be perceived as cool or exciting or fun or whatever the fuck aesthetic people are going for then it doesn’t mean anything, but that’s such bullshit. It's taken me a long time to truly live without needing to receive validation from the people around me and the people on the internet about my life, which is embarrassing to admit but that’s how life is now. Surfing for me was an escape and then it turned into a need for approval and validation from others.

I'm happy to say now I surf because I enjoy it. I know I'm not the best and nowhere even near it but that doesn’t bother me anymore. Surfing is my favorite hobby. It gets me in the water and almost every time I get out of the water, I feel better than I did when I got in. Now I get to wake up and drive ten minutes to the beach and surf with people I love, and I enjoy surfing more than I ever have. No one should be embarrassed to learn grow or get better at something. We all start somewhere and in today's age where most people put on the facade that their life has always been perfect, it’s okay to fail and to suck at something.