The Soul Summit of the Wave

Trends, Surfing Allegories, and the Soul of the Sea

The storm-riven roil of the sea— which is stirring the waves of change—and riding the future.

Where I surf the waves are irregular and wild—they gather steam from global swells and mix up in a frothy mix that is distinctly inarticulate on the Northerly shores of the Washington coast, by comparison rollers running California.

Out here, it’s like surfing a Class 5 river, with lots of force, which we track in kilojoules, 500kj is marginal, but surfable, 2000kj is better, 5000-8000kj is happier, 18000kj is all-out dangerous, an open-ocean rogue—30’-50’. Still, we’ve been out in storms where the swells—at farther-out buoys are showing up as 17-22’ ocean buoy movements [up and down.] Usually with swells at this scale, you’ve got monster winds—which inherently makes long boarding impossible, the risk of a wind-bound board is too high, they’re unmanageable.

In my quest for the waves and the sea, I’ve been in the water all over the world, from Bali to Tofino, BC. from Costa Rica to the North Atlantic, from Kaua’i to Portugal.

Watching the waves is a matter of studying what is far out, as it’s coming towards you, never turning your back on the sea. Always watching; out there.

The waves work in sequenced strings—they travel like sound, the farther out you are, the bigger the waves—which, in distance from the shore, are increasingly overhead waves. And depending on the time of year, and the tides—mostly at high tide—the bigger curls are farther.  And better for the longer run—the ride.

As an engagement, an experience, being in the water, serene or storm–the art of surfing is a holistically sensate contact with the wide current of her, the sea—it’s hard to get out, farther out to ride, in the midst and mist of the effervescent turbulence.

What is distinct is “the sheer fluidity of water,” it roils and boils large,

in the manifestation of the arching curves of the swell, and then it explodes in the curl-out, flattening into a sequence of micro waves—mælstroms in miniature—that are captivating in their sheer liquidity, there are curls, whirls, whorls, vertical ripples and

explosive sine waves of trochoid roll-outs—as above, the circle rolling on the line. This creates the dynamo effect of the curl—it’s a wound-up coil of energy.

I carry a protectively-sheathed camera to shoot my surfing family.
And to shoot the waves.
I surf all year round.

Winter is best. Wildest.
The winter water is 47º.

The water is 52º during the summer—
and at night, late summer, you can see the wave’s glowing curls as
the bioluminescence flowers in the turbulence—in the dark, showing as a blue-green luminous line, glowing waves.

I started body surfing in college, coming from the Evergreen State College in Olympia, but my affinity for the sea goes far back to my childhood on the Jersey Shore, at 5 years, I’d head into the sea with my Dad, on his shoulders,
and we’d keep walking out, farther
and father, into the waves,
until they were overhead.

I learned, quickly, that the experience of getting under the waves—on his shoulders—the luminous, looking-up to the quivering green light from beneath. Lots of seawater inhaled—and fear of repeating the experience, which we did, for years in a string of summers. “Don’t be afraid, I’ll be with you…” Still, we’d get underwater and I’d be trying to shuffle a sort of paddling to stay afloat—but I was beneath the green sealight.

This was a resequencing of fear—going back, again and again—further, Father, fear.

But the key was the emergence of beauty—and the quest, past fear, to the enlightenment of the waves—getting out there, getting beneath, riding back to shore.

Still, today, paddling out, some overheads curl up, revealing their ever-heightening faces, and the sheer torrent shows itself—a massive force threatening with a rising curve of green. And I think about the refuge of the sea, the beauty of her majesty. Wonderment and exhilaration—past the fear to new understanding.
A new awareness. A trial by water.

What does this mean to branding?
The sea, and soul—the actual ancient word for soul—its entwined etymological history is “journey,” as in the soulful voyage of a lifetime—and sea, the pathway across the expanse, soul. You can see more here—the soul, and sea, their intermingled meanings.

Fear is a postulate of risk—to embrace change—
now, as ever, is fraught with fear.
The bold move forward
is never without risk.

Change is new territory.

It’s the unexplored new realm—“what’s out there,
what shall the new story be?
How should we tell it?”

And a brand moves—starting small, expanding, rolling and roving.

A wave is a ripple of a larger swell—it’s a story that travels across the world.
Any wave has a force—there is a seething aliveness and complexity to its energy—and in brand, this is manifested in the people that made the story in the first place and those that carry it forward; it’s the brand experiencer’s reflexive narrative, carrying this personal, relational story forward.

“This is my brand now, it’s my story, that is woven into the story of the brand—and I like that story, it’s useful for me, I have a relationship here.”

The liquid fluency of the expression of a wave, its explosive cyclicality and myriad undulations are mesmerizingly complicated.  Brands have that kind of resilience—they trend, they evolve, their stories offer new evolutions and relevance.

The wave symbolizes the power of an initial ripple that turns into a curve that, in the arc of its narrative, changes in the circumstances of its geographic passage, what lies beneath is evidenced above in the surface modeling of the wave character—one might contemplate a brand initiation, its droplet, its stone in the pond, that rolls out, regionally or globally—and responds to the geography of trend.

Splash, ripple, flow, explode.

Perhaps a key to this contemplation is the notion of metaphor, a referential premise or symbolic value to an act, and, longer form, examining that as an allegorical expression, the depth of meaningfulness in action.

Like the wave, there is the curve of the curl, and its structure is
a direct correlate to what lies beneath.
It is the only substance on earth that exists as a gas, liquid and solid.

Tim | At the Sea
Digital: girvin.com | Built environments: oseanstudios.com
More on the BrandQuest^® and SoulSummit workshops

And may it continue.