The Search
Ripcurl recently revived their old campaign of ‘The Search”. They brought back to life their deep seeded ethos that surfing and exploration go hand in hand. They sell this lifestyle loaded with idyllic beauty, foreign lands, palm trees and jeweled seas.
However, what they failed to highlight in their perfectly sound tracked shots of Alana and friends laughing their heads off then getting vertical in tiny bikinis, and I suppose what many people fail to bring up all together, is that travel is both heaven and hell, that the search is in fact an internal exploration into the corrupted corners of your own mind.
That the search is heartbreak, love, loss and fear.
The search is not just the search for waves or paradise. The search is in fact the indulging of that place in your head that tells you to run. When the strings in your heart twang a little out of tune, leave. Load your shit into your backpack; take the fins out of your board and go. That’s what travel allows you to do - until suddenly you don’t know how to face the thoughts inside your head. Suddenly the only things that will comfort you are airports and the open road.
And then you leave, and wish you were back. And suddenly everyone you love is dispersed around the planet and the time you remember as the happiest you ever were will never happen again.
So you keep looking.
The search is for something far greater than you ever realize.
And my darling, it’s already found.
The search is for nothing but yourself.
And by golly you'll feel alive.
xx