How Women Surfers Can Save the World
A Call to Action
A few months ago, I started a podcast about the transformational power of surfing for women, Dropping In To Power. Just eight episodes in, I have noticed a stunning theme. As women are drawn to the water by the thousands all over the globe, as we are overtaken by the incredible power of stoke, one unifying impulse occurs: we want to GIVE.
We want to gather our sisters, share our stories, share that stoke, share the power of our own inner journeys as our bodies grow stronger, as we are humbled, as we are pounded against the ocean floor, as we feel the flight across the water lifting our hearts and spirits, as we struggle with any kind of mastery of this impossible sport.
While we’re at it, we’re changing the world.
This new wave of women surfers stands in stark contrast to the competitive and individualistic nature of surfing, where surfers have for decades struggled with a pecking order, an enforcer mentality, having to battle for status in the lineup to earn a chance to progress on the waves. Indeed, learning to surf, which is more a calling than a sport, spotlights the clashing elements of what it means to be human within a society: the drive for individual accomplishment, the quest for freedom, the yearning for community, and the deep craving for connection and fulfillment.
To the women surfers who have already struggled for years battling for a place in the lineup and scrapping for waves, I am in no way suggesting that we toss aside etiquette. Experienced surfers will always take off deeper, benefit from a hard-earned skill set and water knowledge to net more waves. New surfers still need to be educated about rotation, about not dropping in on others, about right of way. But I’m speaking to what happens organically when we have more women in the lineup, and how its rhythm and organization change under our watch.
Overall, we are aware that we are in a community. It is that inner reflection that is the thrust of the change. If we have a wave-hog moment, snap at a newbie, get into our heads, or lose our mojo just because someone new paddles out, we typically own our part in it. It is a more holistic view that has big implications for society. And as more and more women are given a voice in surfing, I am noticing that many of us have been silently working a similar program.
In short, we try not to be assholes.
To do this, we ask, how, indeed, do we progress personally, in and out of the water, manage our envy, our frustrations, our successes, while lifting each other up? Even as we battle our fears, our age, shifting conditions, our limits on talent, our fitness, the long learning curve of water knowledge, our deep desire to fly free on an open face, we are determined to make peace with these opposing forces. We learn to “whoop” for our sisters as they get the wave of the day, even if some part of us wishes it was us.
Whether the act is organic, or one we cultivate in the moment, we make the effort, knowing that this is how we make our sessions better.
We take our lumps and do our work and cheer for our sisters, knowing they are facing the same inner battles and will do the same for us. Even as we struggle for our own success, we crave for others to know our stoke, to feel what we are feeling.
THIS is the difference. YES we want to be our best selves. YES we want our moment of freedom. YES we want to send a fantail of spray over a perfect head-high wall, or walk gracefully to the nose of the board to feel the perfect and impossible balance of water, wind, and our earth-based bodies. BUT, we really and truly want others to feel it as well. We are learning to share in, and cultivate, each other’s joy. It is a practice, and it is not always easy, but it is arising from something deep within us.
Of the women from my interviews whose lives have completely transformed through surfing, one has become CEO of the International Surf Therapy Organization, pioneering programs across the globe to allow human beings, especially those who are marginalized, to feel the healing power of the ocean.
Another became a surf doctor and icon for empowering women in the surf and in the medical field @drcandysurfvival.
Another left her paradise to serve in the police force, filled up with her own transformation and ready to serve.
Another started a program in the Philippines to serve disadvantaged youth with surf, education, and protection against calamity @alonandaraw.
Another is creating a book to celebrate women, their bodies, and their connection with nature @natureofsurfwomen.
My next interview is with a woman who is part of a growing community of mothers helping each other find themselves in the maze of motherhood, supporting each other as they reclaim or maybe discover their identities. @joinsurfingmoms.
Even in the more personal stories, there is a sense of profound connection. I have a new BFF in Costa Rica who began surfing at 67, and is eager to share her home with me and other women stoked by the surf.
My first, Aurélie Madec, built a career to allow surf sessions, fought to keep her time in the water through injury, relationship struggles and the demands of motherhood, and now gives back as a volunteer in her local surf therapy organization.
All want to share their stories so we can feel the power of their victories, the pain of their failures, to inspire each one of us to reach deeper, never give up, look within rather than waiting for the validation of others. They want to give us permission to fail, and to thrive.
Nothing against men (a young man whooped for me on a wave this morning!) but in the decades that have passed since the legendary Duke Kahanamoku brought the gift of surfing to the world, lineups have come to focus more on individual accomplishment than the joy of sharing. There are many reasons for this, not the least of which might have been the infiltration of people with bad manners into sacred spaces, and then crowded lineups, but the result has been to strip away shared joy and celebration. This shared joy is now surfacing, and being driven, by women.
Surf schools for women, surf retreats for women, which began with the now-iconic Surf Diva 20 years ago, are exploding globally. Non-profits are springing to life to elevate and to serve, as well as surf contests. Our local hometown Kona girl, Keli Campbell, was way ahead of her time with the Tombomb Wahine Classic, launched in 2008. To win the prize? Get your whole team together on one wave holding hands for five seconds!
In my own transformation, surfing so changed my life that I wrote a movie about it, which has battled in the swirling whitewater of life for nearly two decades and re-emerged in the capable hands of producer Susan Cartsonis and Resonate Entertainment. It birthed a podcast where women surfers have a voice, and we are eager to listen to each other.
So what IS it about the water? What is inspiring these communities of women to gather, to circle, to uplift, to educate? What is this primal force that is calling to women, “listen to the water, come to the water, and gather?” Why GIVE? Why not just battle for our waves?
I found a clue in a recent article aiming to make sense of the war in Ukraine. Written by anthropologist Carla Stang, it calls out the ancient culture of Trypiltsi, where she names the women “Mistresses of Water” and references “a culture which depicted councils as concentric circles of throned women.” In it she implores, “May the people of the Mistresses of Water wash the Marauders away.” I am not certifying the scholarship or inviting an argument (please!). Like all ancient cultures, especially those purported to have goddess-centered religions, there is much academic debate. Rather, I am addressing the feeling that the article, and the reference to female-centric cultures, evokes in so many of us, a sort of primal familiarity, and calling out this archetype that seems to be rising: concentric circles of women.
When women rise together, we can create magic, unleash powerful change, build community, and completely remake the fabric of society. We can do this whether or not institutions fall prey to governmental inefficiency and combative factions, whether or not we agree on everything, or anything, else.
It is happening already. Through non-profit groups, retreats, schools, programs, friendships, women are building concentric circles of community devoted to strengthening our bodies, our minds, our connection and responsibility to nature, our connection and responsibility to each other.
Women are finding themselves and each other in cultures that have been restrictive towards women’s rights, where girls have been shut out of sports, kept out of the sun, or isolated from each other and nature. We are finding new ways to challenge our strength and redefine our limits.
Perhaps it truly is embedded in our DNA, an ancient remembering, or perhaps there is only right now. The water heals us. We know this. We feel this. And it is this FEELING that can guide us to come together.
It is up to us to widen the focus, and to become a literal tsunami of solution. Every surfer has come face to face with garbage in the ocean, plastics, sewage, toxic sunscreens floating on the water. Every surfer sees the bleaching of the coral reefs, and recognizes the larger implications of the practices that have led us here.
It is time to enlist powerful allies. To amplify these growing concentric circles of women around the water, our most primal connection.
As a long-time resident of Hawaii, I have seen what is possible when people are touched by their connection with the ocean. I spent years as a concierge sending tourists on snorkel trips, whale watches, surf lessons. Nearly every human who encounters this magic is transformed. They come back glowing, in awe, happy, and eager to hold on to that feeling.
The challenge is, despite their desire, they cannot maintain this connection once they are absorbed back into their lives, part, again of the churning economy that might allow them to visit the following year. It is like satori –a sudden flash of enlightenment–that is painfully fleeting. How does one keep this glorious connection with nature, this concern for all, when one is catapulted back into a world that does not know how to honor this connection?”
I have also seen a dark side of this connection when developers, and even well-meaning billionaires, recognize the human love and craving for the water, but only know how to own it, to fence it off, to keep it “safe” for themselves or their families, or to profit from it.
The key to me seems to be immersion, education, learning how to share the stoke, and to keep those connections alive. We need to invite more people to experience the idea that this CAN be shared. That they can give up a little bit to share a little bit more. That they will, in fact, feel so much better when they do so, just as women who are finding their joy and their power and their stoke are driven to share, to gather, and to build. Just as we cultivate joy in someone else riding that wave, even if it is a practice and not a completely natural act, because it is rewarding. Just as studies suggest that people are most fulfilled when they are giving back. Many simply do not know-how, or believe it could really work.
We need to expose those who control our resources, our access, and, in fact, the way we produce energy and build economies.
What would happen if we could get the leaders of the oil companies and the plastics manufacturers onto a surfboard, into a concentric circle of women, to help them find their connection to nature, and to each other?
What would happen if more of those leaders were women? And if we continued to stay in touch?
I may suffer from unrealistic optimism, but I believe that most people are just so caught up in their own lives, lost in the chaos and struggle and the drive to protect their own families, that they do not know another way of being. They have not felt the joy of whooping for their sister in the water when she gets her first set wave, or of hearing the breath of a whale as it breaks the surface of aqua blue waters. And even if they have felt it for a fleeting moment, they do not know how to get from there to here.
But we do! We know how. We are paving the way.
A glorious sisterhood of mermazing women is rising on the edges of continents, in archipelagos, creating these concentric circles of leadership that can steward our oceans and create solutions that stretch beyond our surf sessions and build new systems on land that serve both the individual and the community.
Here is one idea: for years, corporations have invested in retreats and team-building exercises to increase productivity, reduce stress, and improve communication. What could be more productive than a group of surf-stoked women guiding the decisions of the world’s largest corporations? It’s time to get those women on corporate and governing boards around the world into the board meetings that really matter — popping up within an army of women in the surf!
Yes, the lineups will be more crowded (I mean, MOST of them won’t move to the coasts), but they will be filled with women in reef-safe sunscreen learning to cheer their sisters and teach their daughters how to cheer for each other. And we can all take turns on the set waves, knitting together the gleefulness of freedom with the responsibility of the community.
We can build these communities in small circles, continually joining together. Vanessa Yeager started the Women Who Surf Facebook group, for example, which has nearly doubled in size since I joined a year ago and is now up to 23,000 members. (Join now if you haven’t already!) Where else can we come together?
It’s time also to inspire the billionaires and the developers to understand that we are all in this together. To encourage those who are already contributing and working in sustainable ways to increase their contributions exponentially, to make it the norm and not the exception to act as stewards, and as spokes in the greater community, to step out from behind their walls. Who can reach out to women in these communities to bring them, literally, on board?
I am calling out what is already happening and asking for all of us to make it bigger.
To join together. To find more ways to connect, and keep connecting. To keep doing what we are already doing, and to recognize the impact we are making! If you have an existing group, or a dream to create one, leave a comment, or find me on Instagram. Let’s make a master plan! Is there a better format than Facebook? Can we do a great gathering and bring all of us together? Does anyone have the know-how to launch a virtual summit? Can we just do a giant Zoom? Let’s get in touch and make it happen!
Because one thing I know from my 20 years in the water, and listening deeply to the stories I am hearing month after month, is that no one is ever too old, too young, too busy, too tired, or too lost, to get stoked. And that stoke can yield more than just personal transformation. It can be our salvation.
Sheila Gallien is a surfer, writer, and single mom, who lives on the island of Hawaii. She currently runs sales and marketing at a US-based manufacturing company, which has nothing to do with surfing, but keeps her grounded in the ways of the world. She also dabbles in spiritual whatnots. Find the Dropping In To Power podcast wherever you listen to podcasts, and articles and other info at www.sheilagallien.com.
