We surf in ridiculous outfits, because it’s time to kick the stigmas of mental health!

It was about 10pm on a Thursday night in Feb last year, when I got home after a few beers and I was thinking…how the hell can we get more people talking about ONEWAVE and mental health? I had never surfed in a business suit, so I thought lets do this. I thought I had a fluro green one from Bali but I couldn’t find that…shit! I worked out my other suit was at the dry cleaner…bugger! I managed to find a shirt & tie… so boardies and shirt & tie it was.

At 6.30am the next morning I rocked down to Bondi by myself with my board meeting kit on –party on the bottom, business at the top. I was quietly shitting myself but on the other hand I was pumped. At last it felt like I had bipolar for a reason…to try and get more people talking about mental health.  I remember getting these weird looks from people and once I got into the surf the comments went from “Straight from the cross for a surf ay bro?” to  “Big night mate?” “Did ya lose a bet buddy?” My response to the first few was “nah got an early meeting – haven’t got time to change” Then I built up the courage to say “I’m dressed up for the ONEWAVE board meeting – we are raising awareness for mental health through surfing”. The reaction I got from some of the surfers when I said this deadset changed my life. You can surf the same break as someone for 10 years and have the usual convos about “how was ya weekend man?” “how was the Indo trip” but you actually don’t get to know how they are actually feeling. Surfers all look so relaxed, like they don’t have a problem in the world. Once you have one conversation with someone in the surf about there mental health, you actually get to meet the real person behind the chilled out surfer and that conversation, might just change someone’s life.  Walking back from the surf that day I was a mix of frothing and emotional… I thought maybe if we dress up in crazy outfits every week, we can actually spark more conversations about mental health.

Thanks to Sammy Samsum. Joel Pilgrim and a bunch of amazing humans we have kept the ridiculous outfits rolling every Fluro Friday at 6.30am, since Feb last year and the ONEWAVE crew keeps getting bigger. The outfits have now changed from board meeting attire to fluro radness…anything from Stretcheyz fluro onezies, matchy matchy flamingos, retro getup, animal suits, fluro budgee smugs...anything goes. We keep getting out of bed early because dressing in fluro and surfing with your mates is so much fun, but the big driver is smashing the stigma of mental health. 

If we were dressed in normal wetsuits people wouldn’t ask us what the hell we were dressed up for and we wouldn’t have the chance to spark a conversation about mental health.  Once you start opening up to people, it is so scary how many good humans, just like you and me have been affected. 1/5 people are affected by mental illness, which means there is a good chance some of your friends and family that are doing it tough, that you don't know about. There is one way we can change this and that is by being open and talking about it.  There is no better place to do this than in the ocean – ONEWAVE is all it takes to give you hope, that you can beat the funks of mental illness. So get your most epic fluro outfit ready and ya favourite craft and come and join the ONEWAVE crew for Fluro Friday - 6.30am at Bondi or Manly.

Thank you for your amazing support and making me feel that having bipolar is actually pretty damn rad. Lets go surf real soon. 

MahaloJ

BIG BEAR HUG

Don't fight the feelings..

The day I worked out it’s actually ok not to be happy all of the time, is the day I started living.

When I used to get down the old me would have been thinking “Why the hell am I not happy? I have a rad family, sweet job, so many good humans in my life. I thought I had no reason to be sad” That just made it so much worse because the negative vibes just kept building up…I was fighting the feelings instead of just feeling them and letting my feelings do their thing.

This resulted in me hiding just how depressed I actually was from my friends and family. I wanted them to still see me as this happy dude who loves life and I certainly didn’t want to go and see a doctor and admit I was suffering from the big black dog. Mum and Dad asked a bunch of times if I wanted to go see a doctor and I would always say “nah don’t worry I will be sweet”.

I didn’t realise at the time that if I had listened to my Mum & Dad then, I could have avoided being hit with crazy anxiety and depression on a trip to Mexico, where I nearly didn’t make it back. I could have avoided days and days of pretending I was happy when I was hurting like hell. I could have avoided being put on the wrong medication, which led to a manic episode at the Aussie surf open and 10 days in the mental health ward of Manly hospital. But hey they say everything happens for a reason, and yep sometimes these things hurt like hell...but at least now I know I have bipolar and everyday I’m learning how to live life as a bipolar bear.

Quite a few people ask me what bipolar actually is. The way I see it is that everyone experiences highs and lows in life and if you have bipolar like me the lows are a bit lower than most people and the highs are a bit higher. It’s all about finding the right recipe to stay balanced, so you can make the most of the good things about having bipolar. One part of my recipe I have discovered is feeling the feelings instead of fighting them. If I’m feeling down, I’m like shit I need to do something to get the positive vibes going instead of getting frustrated at myself.  So I grab my  board and go for a surf or hang with my family or friends and talk about whats going on or sometimes I just wanna chill by myself. The one thing I know is that with time the negative vibes will pass, I just need to ride it out.

One of the important things for me is realizing that it’s ok to have shit days because it makes the good days even radder. It just feels good to be yourself and you realise pretty quick who the good humans in your life are. Feelings are there to be felt, so let them flow and the good vibes will follow.

BIG BEAR HUG