We'd like to acknowledge that traditional custodians of the land on which this podcast was produced, the Galligall people of the orination. We pay our respects to Elder's past and present.
Hi, and here we're taking a short break and we'll be back soon with some more incredible stories. In the meantime, I wanted to reflect on some of the inspirational guests we've had on head Game this year. In this episode, you'll hear from Owen Right, Lane, Beachley, and Blaky Johnston, all surfing legends with truly incredible mindsets. First up, Olympid surfer Owen Wright. Owen was at the top of his game when a traumatic accident completely turned his world upside down.
I felt invincible and this ocean saw me completely and it just pinpointed me and swatted me down. Man, I overlooked a scenario that was really dangerous and instead of chucking my board and diving diving deep, I let, like, you know, like the size of a two story plus built like wave, just lean straight on me, just detonate straight on me, explode me.
So what were you meant to do? So the wave comes up and what you duck? Diving you're supposed to.
You're supposed to bail in those situations, right, So you think it's.
Too late to get too late to get out of the way.
You just you can't.
You can't get around the wave. So you're supposed to dive to the bottom. So you get down meters to get out of the way, and you can kind of it's a bit safer down there. I decided to duck dive, which I'm going to go on like two foot under the water. If that foot, I'm on a big board, just pushing it down about this far under and then I have like two stories of water, just stricken.
You didn't go deep enough.
I didn't go deep enough.
And where you're just thinking of I've done this before before.
I'll be right, and this lack of lack of judgment, implacency, fully complacent. Man just overlooked, I know, just and the thing just detonated me, shook the life out of me. I had what they call like well, I had a tb iron and a severe concussion. But the type of concussion I had wasn't from like blunt force trauma. It was from like a what the doctor in hospital said, like a blast my head looked like a blast victim
from their war vets. That they see is that I got what they call shaken baby syndrome essentially, and it just like shook my head so hard that it had all these bruises and contusions on each side of my brain where it just got bounced off each side.
And this was the washing machine like effect on the washing machine wave.
Yeah, under the wave, and I was just completely ragged old. Yeah, just basically shook the shook the living daylights out one wave, one wave.
Yeah, Yeah, When do you realize you're in trouble?
Do you?
When do you it happen so quick? When do you think I've left up here?
There's a moment in time where I don't, I can't full it was just fully black. Then there's there's a period of time where I remember being conscious but like not able to move or anything, and like just I was still way out the back. It was just I had probably ten of those waves land one after another on top of it. It was so yeah, it was a consecutive. It was like one and then two and three and then four and five. It was like a multiple wave set, just like and because I was the
way the lineup works. I was deep. I was out and deep, and the water rest comes down the reef and pushes you in. So each wave that hit me, I was still in the line of fire because I was just not in I was just slightly down the reef further where the wave was still like landing and dumping. So I got each wave the hallway down and then just like.
You got churned and munched up and in the washin ten waves. Yeah, yeah, one after.
The other, one after the other. I remember just like just just holding on in my mind, just going and just stays just like trying to stay conscious.
Do you think you're going to die at that stage?
Yeah?
Yeah, there's a point where you're just like, I'm done.
Oh yeah, I was everyone.
Coming on done.
I don't know, I'm like, it just felt like I was done already.
Owen's story of recovery and his journey back to his board is inspiring.
If you'd like to hear the full.
Episode, I'll link it in the show notes. My next guest is Lane Beachley. Lane's path to success hasn't been an easy one. The seven time World surfing legend embraced setbacks and use them to propel her growth. In this special interview, she opened up about the moment she learned she was adopted after losing her mother at just seven years old.
Yeah. Well, the thing was like, didn't know I'd lost too mothers at that stage. I only know i'd lost one. And then when my dad decided to tell me I was adopted, I was eight years of age, and that felt that was the biggest capitalist moment in my life because I felt so rejected in that moment, irrespective of how beautiful he was in communicating his truth to me
around you know, I'm your baby girl. He would say, you're my baby girl, and you belong here and we love you, and I've always wanted a girl within this family. But you're not a blood relation. And the minute I heard that, I don't belong here. I am not from this family. I am not of blood relation. So where do I come from? Who do I belong to? Why am I here? Where is my mother? And why didn't you want me?
Yes? Do you think you were too young to take that information in?
We're never too young to take in information. Ever, we're never too young to take in honest communication and truth, and you know we do it. I see a lot of parents say or do or behave in a way to protect their children, but all the doing is literally protecting their own emotional state. You know, you're not protecting your children by lying to them, You're protecting yourself.
And you said that that was a huge moment in your life, right, yeah, huge moment? Yeah, and how do you deal with that moving forward?
Set a goal to become a world champion?
Do you know what? Wow?
What? And what a goal to set yourself down. It's bizarre because when people go through a lot of trauma, they go through you know, traumatic experiences or experiences that really change change their life in the moment, a purpose and a goal, you know, and then we always I know it sounds a bit cliche, but it really does help you focus that aggression, that frustration, that misunderstanding onto something and direct it onto a goal or onto a
purpose that you're truly passionate about. And it's people like yourselves that have been through that that end up high achievers because every because they've managed to bundle it all together and go, right, I've got this purpose. Now, I've got this goal that I need to and I'm going to do it for my mom. I'm going to do it for the family. I'm going to do it forever,
whatever the reason is for that purpose. When was the first time that you realize that, actually, I'm looking good at what I do and I'm going to make a living out this and I am actually going to become a world champion.
Well, firstly, I want to reflect on what you just said in regards to channeling your energy, because it's one hundred percent right. We choose to channel our energy, our focus, our emotions into something. I'd say the most successful people and the biggest misfits have all been through trauma. But it's how we choose to respond to it. And some of us choose to become victims while others choose to
become victors. And I was really fortunate that I had the I don't know if you've read Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers that he refers to three things that contribute to success, and number one is an opportunity, number two is ability, and number three is an arbitrary advantage. And if I think about how those three things played into my ultimate success, I mean I had the opportunit unity to grow up
with a surf loving family. I had the ability to stand on a surfboard, and I had the arbitrary advantage to be close to Manly Beach, so I had consistent access to the environment that I loved to be in. So those things really contributed or gave me a head start to the success that I ultimately craved.
In twenty twenty three, Blaky Johnston achieved one unbelievable goal the Sydney Local Surf continuously for forty hours to raise money for youth mental health initiatives. In this conversation, Blaki revealed just how mentally, physically and emotionally draining those two days were and how he managed to get through it.
It was about accepting every moment for what it was. You know, it's dealing with the ocean. It's always it's
constantly changing, like life is too right it was. It was accepting of everything that came across my way this particular event in particular, I focused on the outcome, you know, I focused on believing that I'd never had as much self belief through that process, through anything, through anything I'd ever done, obviously, through my challenges that I'd set myself and life challenge with luck with my dad, I've I've been through quite a bit and in to this event,
I really I visualized and believed that I was doing it for the right reasons, and I actually manifested the moments beforehand. I was running past the alley every day, imagining this huge crowd that was there and sort of gone a hold whatever, but starting off to just imagine this huge crowds there, I really feel it, but then ended up running past stopping, breathing in, feeling in the moments and visualizing my this moment actually happening, feeling it,
not just thinking this thing is going to happen. So everything that I was doing, liding that and every surf I go for, every time I was down the beach, the intention for everything was towards this goal. So I was you know, I was thinking connected with them, being connected with the moment. So I got to these I got to this one part in particular of the surf
where it was the hardest. My eyes were just on I had to close them most of the surf because the lights were brighter than I thought they were going to be, because the surf was bigger than I thought it was going to be. For the first ten hours really so beautiful day. So the sunrise came up and my eyes were already cooked. On the first day, and you know, I was riding a wave. You know, no one really. I surfed every wave with intention, you know, I surfed it as a surf. I didn't flick off
to get numbers. The wave had a section for a turn. I was going to surf the wave properly.
You know.
I wore one wet suit. I rode one board, just to do it authentic and do it. And when I hit the water, I was full of self left so much saw of self leaf that I wasn't really listening to. There was a doctor on the bitch, slow down, don't ride the waves into the short breaker using too much. You've still got thirty five hours ago. No matter what I was going to I was accepting whatever I was going to go through, it was gonna it was going to be in front of me and I'll get through it.
So yeah, it just it was a lot harder from earlier on, you know, from that first the first morning was just the surf was bigger. I did five hundred duck dives. When you know when you go to the waved about Yeah, between three hundred and fifty and four hundred duck dives going through. I'd rode two hundred and twenty ways by the time the sun came up, so hurt Town came in really early.
It was like, don't appreciate that you're you're in a year you're duck being on the water and you know, keeping yourself in that area, keeping yourself, you know, safe, so you're not.
That's a surface.
One positioning and ideally a world record. It's small and it's clean, and it's your mate through out there with you for support or they're there for water safety. But this was big surf, Like the beaches would have been closed and no easy places to get out, so my friends would come out and they just get smashed around and go in. So I was working really, really hard. So I'm proud of that that I you know, I did it. I didn't hand it to me, the ocean
didn't hand it to me. I had to really work for those waves and those times that I got in and the fact that I surfed every wave and every section I could was something that you know, I'm proud of as a surfer too.
You know, you felt like you completed It wasn't just doing a world record.
I was doing it properly, surfing challenging waves, doing it.
World record wasn't was almost out of your head because you know, if you wanted to go for the world work, you'd hit the wave, come off, hit, They'll go.
Back do it in y key key thirty five degree water. But this was about, you know, proving to the people that everything had build up around the event. There was people who was one hundred and fifty people there at one am in the morning when I was paddling out. You know, so I have a responsibility, like I always field, to be accountable to my word and do it properly. And I know a lot of kids were there watching and it was getting broadcasted, you know, globally.
So it was a huge event. Yeah, it was an.
Opportunity to show you know that is do what you say you're going to do, be accountable to you, and you can do the things that you set out to do.
Hear these incredibly moving stories from Owen Right, Lane Beachley, and Blakey Johnston in full.
Now.
I've linked the episode details in the show notes. Thank you so much for listening to Headgame. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure you're subscribed and leave me a review.
Wherever you're listening, I'm add Middleton. See you again next time.