Dialogue- A Surfers Horizon

When I pause for a moment and look around I am reminded of the humility that I feel whenever I get on my board and paddle out past the breaks.  In the moments before I pass the breaks, my arms are paddling as fast as they can, my legs are kicking as fast as they can, and sometimes (depending on the power of the surf) I am praying that I will make it before the next wave comes crashing down. And I am nothing compared to the power of the ocean. I am at its mercy. I could be beat down with the crash of one wave, swallowed up with one wave, I could become a meal for a great white, I could lose my breath under water never to surface with life again, I am but one body that can be broken with the smallest dose of power that the ocean holds. 

This humility that the ocean has taught me stays with me as I exit the water and I live my life on land.

Unfortunately, it has been some time since I have been able to ride a wave, but the lessons I have learned from the ocean and riding waves stay with me.

Humility, for me is a reminder that I can be swallowed up at any time. Not just by the surf, but by nature, by words, by competition, and lots of other things, but the point is that life can swallow me up and spit me out. 

With the realization of humility comes compassion.

When I think about dialogue, I think about these things. I think about things that are greater than myself, I think about a communication activity that is greater than what we could ever hope to accomplish. It is an ideal that we can strive for with humility and compassion. It is something that can be practiced, it can be attained, but not with hubris and without compassion.

These past few weeks I feel a bit of sensory overload because of the attention being given to the massive suffering around the globe. And, it isn’t like much of this is new, it just seems that many climaxes are happening at the same time. It kinda feels like I am trying to head out past the breakers and I can’t. The surf keeps getting bigger and bigger and I am realizing that I am not as young as I once was. I am loosing my breath, my muscles are tires, and I am running on pure faith and adrenaline. But, like always as I go over a wave and as I am on the peak I can see past the sets of waves, I can see the horizon, and that sight gives me the strength to keep paddling.

Similarly as I see people making concerted efforts to starve social programs, bombs being dropped overseas, nuclear tensions rise, millions without clean water, a country in a state of national emergency, tsunami’s, earthquakes, tornado’s, and violent words I also feel like I am unable to pass the breakers. I feel a bit stuck, out of breath, tired, and running on pure faith and adrenaline.

What I am left with is this drive to keep going, to make it past the set of waves to the calm of the ocean, where I can watch the sun set into the water, where the sky and the ocean meet, where people are not suffering, where people are helping others, and where compassion and humility live. The space where I can sit on my board and daydream, where I can hear the waves, where I am reminded that I am mortal. It is in a space such as this that I believe dialogue can occur and it is in such a space that I encourage others to enter.