What is surf therapy? How does a surf therapy session look like?
Many surfers show a great interest in our surf therapy program, and it's sometimes difficult to explain what exactly we do. That's why we decided to invite the team of Waveup for a demo surf therapy session on Lake Zurich in Switzerland.
Our surf therapy program follows a curriculum with different excercises to develop skills to cope with stress and trauma, and help develop positive self identities.
The core part of any of our surf therapy sessions is the Teachable Moment. The participants practice behaviours that help them experience positive emotions, and control negative emotions. Passionate mentors then ask key questions that help identify how these behaviours can be used in everyday life to improve the mental health.
Surf Therapy "Powerhand" Demo Session:
We started off with a Take 5 excersice, a breathing technique to calm down and connect to each other. After a fun warm-up excercise, we sat in a circle and did the Powerhand excercise to recognize our own strengths and be more positive about ourselves. When we name our strengths, we can feel strong and good about ourselves, which can help us deal with stress and challenges.
By sharing our own strengths with the other participants we learn to listen, communicate, and respect each other’s strengths.
While the rain started to fall, we had a playful paddle session and some moments to think about the Powerhand. We concluded our surf therapy session with another Powerhand meditation and a debriefing, where we shared our thoughts and what we learned. And most important, how we could incorporate those positive behaviours and tools into our daily lives to clam down and feel good about ourselves.
Our goal with surf therapy is to help kids and youths in Trinidad develop skills to cope with stress and trauma, and help them develop positive self identities. Our surf therapy programs provide young people with the opportunity to practice new behaviours and coping skills that can improve the way they deal with the impact of stress.
We know we cannot change the situation that the children live in, but we can give
them the tools to cope more effectively with the challenges they face every day.
A big thanks to our friend Nikolas Reigel, ImageBakery.ch for filming this demo session and supporting @wavesforhopetrinidad.