I Might Try Email

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I have been avoiding my email for approximately 13 years.

Checking my email feels like walking into an Everything Must Go sale at the Christmas Tree Shop.

I can’t remember the last time I opened my inbox.

How many trips around the world have I won, and missed out on?

How many would have been lovers risked it all only to never hear back from me?

How many chain letters am I now cursed forever for not forwarding?

When I hear the ping of an email come in, my lazy eye goes sideways, my teeth chatter, my shoulders tighten. It’s like a knock on the door when it’s snowing, I’m in my jams, sipping red wine and watching Killing Eve. Whatever it is, don’t want! Whatever it is, pass!

I find I use the imagery “life lunging at me” often in life, which means I’m constructing a world where I feel life is happening at me. I use that phrase a lot when I think of email.

Hmm.

Back to Wayfair coops and satisfaction surveys.

Anyway, I might try email. See what all the fuss is about and maybe, as an added bonus, overcome a paralyzing fear of life while getting $10 bucks off a pair of Hokas.

We’ll see.

free my sol

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free my sol is a phrase I’ve had rumbling around in my mind for a long time. It works on so many levels: free my soul (unleash, set free the spirit/ being/true self/let your true self be seen); free my sole (untether/release/set free the self from a situation, context, state of being, or more literally, run the world, surf the world, travel the world); and free my sol (the Spanish word for sun), as in let your inner light and joy shine, warming you and others.

My good friend came over for dinner. “Bring two of your favorite tea bags,” I said, when she asked what she could bring. She brought over Egyptian licorice, which was spicy and delicious. And on my tea bag, at the top, on the little piece of paper you drape over the rim of the mug were these words: May your light become a living universal light.

Can it really be that simple? I asked myself. And I’m leaning towards yes.

I’ve often wondered if that’s enough—if it’s enough to simply be happy and shining, and at the end of the day, I think it is. Those words captured that, as do the words of the late great Sharon Jones: I sing because I’m happy, I sing because I am free., as well as the Anne Franks’ simple and striking observation: Whoever is happy, will make others happy too. Our thoughts and our energy are two of our most valuable resources.

There’s no end to the dreams I have, and the things I want to do, and the experiences I want to have and share in this life with the people I love. And I’ll do all of them, or some of them, and I can’t wait. But most importantly is that I’m simply shining and dwelling in gratitude and vibrating at the highest frequency, remembering the core which is ever-drumming, ever calling, and remembering what Mary Oliver always remembered, that we all have a place in the family of things.

How beautiful, how reassuring, how magical is that?

My Book: Be Surf: A Surfer's Brief Manual for Living = Published and Live on Amazon!

The day is finally here! The book I’ve been working on about my anecdotes learned through surfing is available on Amazon. This short and sweet collection of vignettes was so damn fun to write and I am really proud of it. My extremely talented friend and fellow surfer Amber H Myers on the cover design.

Here’s a quick summary—if it sounds up your alley, would love if it could find a place in your home or your e-reading device :-)!:

Cold water surfer Sara Dyer distills lessons learned through her time surfing the coast of New England and beyond in this brief manual for living and being. With candor, wit and good vibes, she offers bite-sized anecdotes, reflections and challenges on living our best lives on and off the water.

A treasure trove of advice for both surfers and general lovers of wildness and living an authentic life, readers will keep this in their pocket for inspiration to dive in when they’re feeling resistance, be it cold water or any challenge in life.

Walk through the fear and eat donuts
If you ride a wave, you’re a surfer
Join the party
You have a right to be here
It’ll go a lot more smoothly if we keep our heads