This goes with any skill based activities, but learning a skill can often be very frustrating and stressful, be it learning how to play music, learning to write, and of course learning to surf bigger, faster waves with shorter boards. When it comes to surfing though, the consequence of trying something and it not working can be physically punishing, and I know as spectators that punishing part is just as fun to watch as a surfer surfing in style; like someone going over the falls then creamed by oncoming mass of white water. But as far as that part of surfing goes, I am not so frustrated about that. Being calm and relaxed in the situations like that is almost a requirement to take on "more difficult" waves.
The true frustration sets in when there is a good ride you have been dreaming of executing, and on day that happens, but then it never happens again. Once you taste a "dream" ride in a situation that you have not executed before then it is really exciting. It is either I was lucky or my whole system, from my mind, body, and the choice of equipment are starting to work together. But when you paddle back to the break that never happens, sometimes for days or even for months, and that's one aspect of become being very frustrated with the inconsistencies.
But surfing is probably one of the most inconsistent sports around. The nature itself is very fickle about providing consistent conditions. We don't take the waves for granted, we often be forced and seek them, or paddle around from peak to peak on a single session; tide changes, wind changes, and swell direction, period and height changes constantly, the sand bottom shifts, a rip opens and closes down... So by the time you surf for a few years, you kind of get used to all that.
Come to think, many of my good surfer friends I aspire to are mellow, patient and have established their own philosophy in life.
So it always comes back to me that we should enjoy the process of learning how to surf.
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