The Beach

THE BEACH

March 14, 2015 - Eden Medical Center ICU Unit, Castro Valley, CA “Mr. Hamilton?” the ICU doctor asked, as he walked into my room. “Uh, yes?” I responded, a little startled. I knew something had happened but because of what just occurred, I wasn’t very self-aware. I was there, knew why I was there, but wasn’t very up on, or had difficulty remembering, the details. I was in a fog. It was a condition which I would grow to be more aware and hateful of over time…a condition that would become both my obstacle and motivation for the many months and years to come. “Hello, I’m the doctor in charge of the ICU. How are you feeling?” “OK,” I said cautiously and somewhat inaccurately. I had no idea how I was doing and a rather sketchy sense of what I was doing. “Alright, well I just wanted to know if you got the message,” the doctor said. “Message?” “Yes…did you get the message?” he repeated. “I’m sorry. I’m not understanding you,” I said, which was probably the most accurate statement I could make given my condition. “OK…I just want to know if you got the message,” he repeated. “Really…I don’t get it!” I said, exacerbated. Even in this cloudy condition, there was still enough of me near the surface that I could express my growing frustration with the confusing dialogue. And some of the frustration was that I had no clue as to the source of the confusion.

“You are a very lucky man,” he began. With no pause he jumped in, but not in the way I was expecting. “You just had a stroke. And while you shouldn’t be scared or worried, that lovely woman with you SURE IS! You have some effects of stroke but in the big scheme of things, you are very lucky. “You’ve been sent a big message that you are lucky enough to be able to act on. All those unhealthy things you’ve been doing need to stop...you need to take care of yourself!” As he looked over to my wife Dora he added, “She shouldn’t have to be scared like this again. So, going back to my original question…you get the message?” While I was still in the Fog, I was aware enough to have gotten the gist of the message. “Yes. I get it,” I said. “Great! Now get some rest,” he said in a completely different, caring tone of voice. “If you need anything from us, just call. Take care. I’ll check-in with you later.” Over the next two days, he would stick his head into my room, make a spastic motion with his hand, curling his fingers in a loose fist, and shoot me a wink and a smile to check-in on me. That was part of the restart of my life in March, 2015. I remember it like it was yesterday despite the long road I have walked since. How that doctor knew the exact way to get through to that 60-year-old man, I don’t know, but I am thankful for it. Of course, he was right. None of us is invulnerable and even Superman has his kryptonite. As I recovered, I dealt with a couple of medical complications, and experienced some phenomenal twists of fate and so I decided to share some of the lessons from my own and others’ lives. We’ve all gone through or know someone who has gone through some rough patches. I have also experienced other ups-and-downs in my life. The ups have been fantastic and the downs have really sucked—a technical term referring to less than positive experiences. However, I am a very lucky person in that the downs have been rare. The challenges are not different than those with which many of you and your loved-ones have had to face. However, I don’t want to leave this life without sharing the lessons I have learned in the hope that others would avoid the

avoidable and cope more effectively with the unavoidable. There is something particularly soothing about being in the ocean and as I considered how best to share my story, I I visualized the ebb and flow of ocean waves. I have always loved watching, smelling, and tasting the sea. While most of my experience in water was within the confines of swimming pools, bonding with the black line on the bottom of the pool that designated the middle of each swimming lane, I have also had a fair amount of experience in the ocean, swimming, snorkeling, and body surfing. In the book, The Yoga of Bodysurfing by Dr. David Lane, a comparison is made between riding the ocean waves without a surfboad and Hatha Yoga. Dr. Lane defines bodysurfing as the, “art of riding waves with the human body.”1 The elements of Hatha Yoga include: mastery of body postures known as asanas; mastery of hand positions known as mjdras; mastery of breath control known as pranayama; and mastery of concentration known as dhyan. Later in the book, bodysurfing is described as a “a liquid form of yoga that involves all of one’s senses within an oceanic arena.”2 That arena necessitates an understanding of how the wind, shape, size and speed of waves interact with each other and within the environment overall. The art and skill of bodysurfing seems like a meaningful way to think about how we manage our lives. By being part of and inside a wave simultaneously is essential to achieving a successful ride, just as being part of and inside our lives is critical to our personal fulfillment. Further, courage, knowledge, skill, energy, passion and adaptability are also core to both. In my conversations with Vince Askey, the founder of the Del Mar Bodysurfing Club and a fellow swimmer from my early Ladera Oaks Swim and Tennis Club days, we discussed that another key to bodysurfing is to learn from one’s own and other’s experiences. Vince spoke of sharing with less experienced surfers, often when out in the water, his knowledge

1. David Christopher Lane, The Yoga of Bodysurfing ©2018 Published by MSAC Philosophy Group, p.1 2. David Christopher Lane, The Yoga of Bodysurfing ©2018 Published by MSAC Philosophy Group, p.51

and guidance to assess each ride and learn from the experience. He also shared that this learning process, coupled with skill development and natural talent, enables people to overcome the fear of challenging situations. In life, just as we have the opportunity to learn from our own experiences, we have the opportunity, if we avail ourselves of it, to learn from others with more experience or proficiency, through observation and conversation. While we cannot incorporate the input from others instantaneously, we can train ourselves to adopt the habits or traits we admire, a key part of the human experience. You may miss a wave or go “over the falls,” but if you learn from the experience and apply that learning to the next wave, the experience has not been wasted. As my mother used to say, “Those are the cards you’ve been dealt,” when referring to a difficult circumstance. Her guidance was always to not be brought down by that experience, but to draw on your experience and talent to overcome the challenge ride the wave as best you can. Throughout my life I have tried to follow that guidance, and I must say, life has been very good.