#9: Garrett McNamara (Big Wave Surfer) - Seeking Balance and Presence Amongst the Waves of Fatherhood

Through surfing I can pretty much do anything. But it's like what do we do? Who do we work with? How do we make a difference? How do we give back in the best way humanly possible? Or is it just focusing on the kids, focusing on being a good father, raising children that are good contributors? I think it's a balance.

This is the Athlete Dad Podcast, where we explore the intersection between physical pursuits and fatherhood. I'm Ben Gibson, and if you're an ambitious dad that is pursuing or looking to pursue your athletic passions now while improving the way you show up at home, then this is a show for you. In the sport of surfing, there are surfers, and then there are big wave surfers. Big wave surfers are a totally different breed of human doing a totally different version of the sport. The ocean can be a really terrifying place, especially when you're sitting amongst giant swell and waves. That can remind you exactly how powerless you can be when going up against something like the ocean and just how easily it can push you around. In fact, very few people have even witnessed what big wave surfers would consider to be a big wave or a good swell. Take, for example, there's this contest, eddie I Cow, big Wave Infantational, where they won't even run the contest unless the waves are consistently 20 feet tall, which is crazy, until you find out that places like JAWS, mavericks and a special wave off the coast of a small village of Nazare in Portugal are surfed with waves that reach anywhere from 30 to more than 80 feet tall. 80 feet, that's the equivalent to surfing an eight-story building that's moving 60 to 80 miles per hour. That's a speed where a wipeout sees a body skipping across the water like a pebble across a lake. These waves are heavy, big, fast and they are deadly. I give you all that context because you'll need it to fully understand how epic the pursuits of today's guest, garrett McNamara, are and to fully appreciate that when Garrett talks about the challenges of fatherhood, it's spoken by someone who has personally ridden a 78-foot wave. There's this quote circulating the internet right now that says parenting is only hard for good parents, essentially saying that it's hard because you're really working to show up as a great parent, as a great dad, and that quote, I think, really summarizes a lot of my conversation with Garrett. Being a great dad, or at least trying to be, is really damn hard sometimes. I think it's not often that men and dads we get to have this very real conversation around how challenging it can be, and that's one of the things that I really appreciated about my conversation with Garrett is just the authenticity in which he spoke about these challenges. Now, garrett is an international big wave explorer known for discovering and pioneering the biggest wave in the world at Nazaré, portugal. You may already know Garrett from the HBO series 100-Foot Wave or from the other endeavors that Garrett has pursued as a big wave surfer. He is an eight-time world record holder for the largest wave ever surfed and he's part of the only team to have ever surfed waves generated by a 300-foot calving glacier in Alaska. Most importantly, he and his wife, nicole and their family are on a mission to share the importance of connecting to nature. I had a chance to catch up with Garrett from his home in Nazaré, portugal, and we talked a lot about those hard things and how to try to approach them with a sense of gratitude and choice. We talked about how surfing has completely influenced the life that he lives and the way that he shows up as a dad. We've explored the idea of purpose and meaning, and often we come up with more questions than answers. It's a very real, authentic and meaningful conversation and I'm just really grateful that Garrett and his family, nicole and the kids, were able to squeeze us in and share some of the wisdom with us. Now we do talk about some specific waves and breaks, so I'll add them to the show notes so you have some visual context for these incredible places that we talk about, but I really think that you're going to appreciate and love this conversation. Without further ado, please enjoy my conversation with the father, husband and man who also happens to be a legendary big wave surfer, mr Garrett McNamara. Garrett, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today. I am so grateful for your time. It's so grateful to have you here. It's a pleasure.

And anything to share about being a father, I mean, and I'm really looking forward to learn anything that you can share with me as well how to balance things. It's all about balance and I can do pretty well on the board, but it's very challenging in life on the land.

Yeah, Isn't that interesting how much easier it is to just go balance on an 80-foot wave. But then we come home and it's like, wow, this is way harder. So yeah, I'm super pumped and I think, to sort of set the context I'd love to hear about what does dad life look for you right now?

Well, we've been moving around a lot. We've been traveling a lot. At home in Hawaii it was get up in the morning, get breakfast ready for the kids and then get Thaya to her school, get Faye from Nicole so Faye Nicole can sleep, and then take Barrel to do something after I've dropped off Thaya. Ideally we go surfing. I either take him on the jet ski and tow surf or take him to a surf spot and with Faye sometimes it's going to be a little more challenging because if there's waves, Nicole and Grandma and Papa all three don't want Faye on the jet ski when there's waves and I mean, yeah, it's a little dangerous, but if it's really small and she has a life jacket on, I feel pretty confident. But even then. So I have to leave her behind and take Barrel out. She's screaming and she wants to come on the jet ski and somebody has to grab her. And then me and Barrel go half the time of our life I put him on 50 waves in an hour and then we come back and then he likes to go fishing and we can take Faye on the fishing missions. But you know, a lot of days the waves aren't ideal and it's not good to tow or paddle, and in Hawaii I get pulled into the art. I really love trying to finish everything. I want everything to be finished so that way I can fully enjoy it, but I think there'll always be something, so I just have to really enjoy it while I'm there. I leave for three months, I leave for six months. Everything's fine, the property's fine, whether it's finished or not. I come home and I just work in the yard and play with the kids, and I think I need to be a little more present with Nicole and the kids when I'm not doing what I really enjoy doing with them, when we're doing something that's more, you know, not quite as fun.

Yeah, I hear that I think the presence is the hardest thing and I liked what you said in the beginning of you know here to learn I think that's really the goal of the podcast is, like you know, I believe people change for either inspiration or desperation, and I was really in a moment of desperation because I was really struggling with balance. I was pursuing my dreams but it came at the expense of my family and family time, and so you know, I think that you know the best we can really do is just be aware of where we might not be showing up the way that we want to show up. And I hear you on the present side, I struggle with that too. You know I just got back from a climb in Alaska and I feel like I haven't really been my full present self for a month even after coming back. You know how do you feel that struggle is for you when you are, especially when you're going after these really big, audacious goals, or you've just got back from traveling, like. Like, tell me about presence and where it may be challenging for you in your life.

One thing that really keeps me from being present is the phone, and we go so far as to only have one phone. We have a bat phone that in case one of us is going to go somewhere. We have another phone that we activate when we need to and we had it off forever and it was nice because one of us is always present when the phones are both on and then I get sucked in to look at a server report or sucked in to check in an email or a text or a phone call or or Instagram. The phone is probably the biggest distraction and the hardest thing to balance. Like you just stuck is like the phone is definitely not the Android. We are the androids now because this is it, and I find myself that I was watching the series and I'm like this. Half the time I was like, oh, I'm telling the camera and don't feel me when I'm on the phone and he's filming. It was the only time I get mad and the only thing I don't want him filming is when I'm on the phone. So I'm working on being more present. The thing is to work on really enjoying and really loving all the situations we choose to be in and if we're in the situation, love it. But it's a really challenging concept. I'm working on it. I'm working on okay. When I'm just sitting there with Faye and she wants to go do this or that and I want to be doing something else and I have to say Okay, do I have a choice to be no? No choice is where I have to be Okay. So love this fully and be present and have fun. And that concept is. It's amazing. It's the most beautiful concept and one of the most challenging, but it's realistic. We all have the choice to love all of the situations we get into, whether it's a challenging one or not. We can choose to love it or we can choose to get angry and, for lack of a better word, make ourselves toxic and not fun to be around and lower our vibration and show up with this funky vibration that everybody feels and then the room changes and everybody changes. It's all about our vibration, balance and vibrations. So, if we can balance the things we love to do and the things that are challenging and no matter what, whether we love it or we feel it's challenging show up with this positive, good vibration. If I'm happy and I'm doing things that I like doing, I got the good vibration, but if I'm doing things that I prefer not to be doing, I can tend to lower my vibration and it ruins the room Everybody changes everybody in the room, everybody encounter everywhere you go. You just I think of some people. They can easily change the vibration of a room by showing up with a good or bad vibration. Other people might just kind of navigate the room no matter what vibration there are in, and certain people show up in the whole room changes for business. It's like so important to show up with a good vibration again.

I love what you said about choice. You know, like reminding ourselves that we're we can choose how we want to show up. We can choose, or I at least remember that we chose this moment. We chose, you know, these hard things and that's always my preference too is a very stubborn individual, if I can frame it that way, and I really like how you said it. But it's like, you know, I'm gonna choose my heart and I have chosen this hard, so I'm gonna enjoy this hard when you choose it and enjoy it, then it's amazing, but if you don't, then it just talks it. Yeah.

For you and everybody around you.

Yeah, that idea of, like you said, changing the room. A friend of mine always said that you know you can either be a thermometer or a thermostat when you show up for your family, so you're either just there matching the temperature of the room. So you know, I think about it in the context of like you come and there's chaos and you're just like matching the chaos. You come and you're like what's going? on okay everybody chill out, like to stop doing that, get down, or you can be the thermostat right where you're like, okay, I'm reading the room. I need to bring a little bit more positive energy to here, let me. Let me lower the temperature here a bit, bring a little bit more fun. And I, like you said the high positive frequency, let me bring that to the equation. And I think about that in terms of when I'm making transitions, because I noticed that I wouldn't be present coming out of transitions. I come home from work, right, come back from training or a climb or anything, and I have to be very conscious about this idea of I'm gonna land deliberately in this moment and choose how I'm gonna have my feet touch the ground, and I think just that alone has been so helpful in this idea talked about of Choosing the moment, however it may be good or bad, difficult, easy but also the idea of choosing what kind of vibrations, what kind of energy am I bringing to this Moment here, and of course, it's way easier said than done, but like that's the practice that I'm, I'm trying to be more conscious about. Yeah, definitely going in the right direction.

Yeah, in a good way. I like to say do it in a good way.

Yeah, yeah, I love that you you had said something one time. I think it was like surf for the right reasons, and I I thought about that in terms of, like, how you show up in life, like doing it for the right reasons, do it the right way. I think that that's probably something that I imagine is come from surfing and influence life. Like you know, you've you've spent your career surfing. What are the ways in which you think that surfing has influenced the way that you've shown up as a dad?

It would influence me to get in the water with the kids and share the ocean and get them excited about, you know, being in the ocean and fishing and I'm not much of a fisherman but I support my son fishing and surfing and diving and it is such a selfish sport and we go chase waves because we love to and you know we spend all our money half the time going to do what we love and and take the so much time away from the family and and then you're racing to get back to the family and not spend a lot of time wherever you go. So I always did it, always went, got the wave get out, I kind of. Some people are saying yeah, like a hit man. you go in, you hit the waves and you get on the same, and that's how I did prefer to do it but you don't embed yourself in the culture and you don't really submerge yourself and learn about where you were and I mean it's probably hard to, especially at this point.

I imagine it's hard to extract surfing from most of your life because it's been such a pivotal part of you as a human. You as a dad use a husband just just in how you show up. You know big wave surfing. People might characterize it as like, oh, you're just an adrenaline junkie, oh you're, you're taking unnecessary risks. But when you hear yourself talk about it, you listen to yourself in the documentary you can tell there's much more purpose behind it. There's much more meaning behind it and even what you just described now, where you know the importance of the history and the culture and embedding yourself in this thing. You know why do you think these pursuits, big wave surfing are so important for you and how you want to show up as a human, as a whole part of yourself.

I think that for me, the pursuit and big wave surfing was always, for the first half it was was my passion and I did do it for the rush, but it was how I put food on the table and I had to produce something every year. So there's a lot of ego and a lot of I was always keep surfing, be able to keep surfing without going to get a nine to five. So I would make sure that when that big swell was going to Tahiti or that big swell was going to Jaws or wherever the big swell was going, that was going to be the swell of the year or the swell of the decade. And I was there and I did something monumental or at least something that the companies I'm working with could showcase, as, yeah, garrett did it again or however the heck it were wiped out, or whatever I did to get a few of the heaviest wipeouts and some of the heavier waves here and there. And, yeah, it's just very interesting to surfing and where it takes you and what it does for you and to you and it's really spiritual, it's it's really just being in the barrel. You're in your own world. It's like time stands still. The ocean is kind of like your church and your playground and somehow your office as well. Which kind of weird at the times when you're like working where you love to be and you have to focus on doing these things, when you just want to focus on enjoying the moment and following your heart.

Yeah, I imagine that's got to be a really unique struggle of making a career out of your passions, because I imagine it sometimes and maybe I don't know, but it might, because it's a job. Sometimes I imagine it might lose its stoke or lose its luster of like I have to go do this, but you have made a very long career out of surfing. How do you find that it's helpful for you to maintain that enthusiasm or maintain that really meaningful spiritual connection with surfing, so that you still get out of it what you want personally but that you can still continue to do it also as a career?

It's funny. It's been a little challenging lately with all the kids and obligations and having to be a dad for the second time. Well, the funny thing is I can be on the land for a long period of time these days, like weeks or maybe even a month, without surfing. I just like to surf the really perfect days. I mean I'll go out and get barrel waves, I'll go out and get friends waves, and if there's nobody drive me, I can't even get away, which is a little frustrating. But I'll be on the land thinking, ok, I'm good, I'll be fine, I'm going to have to surf. I mean, back in the day, if I stay out of the water for a couple days or a week, I would like to fish out of the water. I was losing my mind if I missed a big swell that was somewhere in the world that I had that, I had the money to get there, I had the possibility to be there and I didn't go. I was literally on suicide watch if I missed it. Nowadays I don't have to be on any of the swells. I mean I definitely when I see something somewhere that, like if Fiji goes off and it's 20 feet and I'll be a little edgy that I didn't go. Or if there's some perfect wave somewhere that I could have been on but I didn't go, I could be a little edgy about it, not suicide watch, but just like, oh man, that would have been nice. But then when I go in the water and I'm palling out on a good day, I'm just so happy and I'm like thank you, thank you. It's like so grateful and and thinking how could I ever think that I don't need this, that it's for your spirit, for your soul, for your physical, mental. It's just so special, special, and it feels so good to just paddle out on a perfect day and you see all your friends in the lineup or drive out to some spot and there's nobody there but you and your buddy, or there's three other teams, or there's 50 team, but the waves are just firing in your, in your, having a blast is. There's nothing like it. I don't know, somehow I'm able to enjoy the land, make the best of being on the land and not have to be in the water. But then, once I go back in the water, I'm just like how could I ever think that I don't need to be in the water?

yeah, sure, yeah, I relate to that, I think I you know, when I lived in San Diego and I was at the beach daily and it was such a big part of my life, just the excitement of when you're driving and you can finally start seeing the waves in the swell and you're like almost crashing your car, like, oh, dude, it's so good today. Oh, look at that left and you're just like that pure stoke. It's like you're a kid again, you know. You know you're just that pure, unfiltered joy and, yeah, you hope that you never lose that. And it's so great to see and hear that, even though the sport has really progressed for you over a long time, that that stoke is still still there. In one aspect I'm curious about to, and especially given the you know size of the waves that you're surfing, is this idea of risk. You know, when I, when I was pre dad, you know I had a very different assessment of risk and things that I was comfortable, you know, putting myself into, especially in the mountains. You know how do you think risk has changed for you since becoming a dad, if at all? Because I distinctly remember like this mental shift, even just when my wife was pregnant, I was on a climb and I bailed because I just like was not, I was not in the right headspace for the risk that I was putting myself into, and I think since then it's been very different. So has risk changed for you since becoming a dad?

Before I had children, I honestly didn't mind passing riding big waves, because it's what I love to do more than anything, and I had no problem dying in the big waves. I made sure I did the training, did what I needed to do so I wouldn't. I wasn't on a death wish, but I loved it so much that it didn't matter to me really if I passed away while surfing. Once I had children, I told myself that I would never die surfing and that I always train and be ready for the situations I'm going to get myself in. I got the sixth sense. I know what the good days and the bad days are and when to throw the towel. I've actually thrown the towel a couple of times in the last 20, 30 years. Jaws was definitely the spot where I decided to drive and not surf Since 2016, when I shattered my shoulder at Mavericks. That's when things really changed. It wasn't due to the children. It was due to the injury that I received and had to endure for still to this day. The pain that I had to suffer for so many months, even years, from the shoulder injury was so overwhelming that it really took me out of the game pretty much mentally and physically and spiritually it really ruined me. I was 2007,. I lost. There was no more fear for me in the ocean. I was very comfortable and it was normal to go out and surf giant waves. It was normal to stay underwater as long as I needed to. It was normal to get pounded like you've never been pounded. It was actually more fun for me to get pounded than it was for me to make a wave. I really enjoyed getting pounded much more than making waves, because there was a possibility of getting the rush. When I'm underwater, no control, at the mercy of the ocean, I still wasn't getting rushes, even though it was because I was just having fun underwater and coming up. No, I'm coming up. Then, 2007, in Alaska, we did the glacier surfing and it just was a sensory overload. From that day forward, the ocean was easy and fun. Oh, not easy. The ocean was comfortable. I still had respect 100%, but I was too casual, too nonchalant, like whatever. If I make it, I make it. I'm going to do my best to make this wave, but I'll take off 10, 20, 30 feet deeper than everybody and try and pull in. If I get pounded, no problem, I'm going to do my best to make it, but I'll put it all on the line to get the ultimate ride. If I get pounded, fine, I'm ready. Then, after the shoulder shattered and the pain was so severe, for so long I haven't really gotten myself back 100% as far as my lung capacity. I broke my foot, got concussion and anytime I get pounded I start thinking about the kids and start thinking about Nicole and start second guessing whether it's worth it. Then I get on the land. A couple of weeks pass, a month pass and I go forward. I'm still having a back of my mind, Like am I going to enjoy it? Do I even want it? I'm not going to do it unless I feel up to it. Then this year we went out to Cortez Banks and it was perfect, glassy, and I wanted some bombs badly. The bomb came to me and then for some reason we didn't get it. It was mine but we didn't go. I lost my mind. It was buttery, 50, 60, 70 foot butter and we didn't go. I lost my mind. I was like I wanted it. Then we went to Hawaii and same exact thing. The condition weren't quite as clean but they were good and I wanted it. We didn't go. Lost my mind. Right now I'm thinking was that my last hurrah? Was that my last chance I had?

it.

I wanted it and I didn't get it. So then now I'm thinking to myself okay, at least I got. We're moving to Italy for the year. I'm going to be able to really focus on the wife, the kids. The icing on the cake is training for a year without really surfing. I'm going to couple swells here and there. I'm close to France, I'm close to Spain, I'm close to Portugal, I'm close to Ireland, close to Morocco. So at the epic, epic days appear and I'm feeling good. Then I can to our plane ride, two to four, our plane ride. I'm anywhere and surfing, perfect waves. But I don't have to. We'll see if I'm feeling up to it. The goal is just to train for a year and get my shoulder mobility and get my lung capacity and get physically, mentally, spiritually back to where I was. But there's also the identity, like who am I if I'm not surfing? And a surfer and little identity crisis going on. I'm so lucky, I just need to be so grateful. Healthy, healthy children. We have food on the tape, we have roof over our head. So now it's working on spirituality and enlightenment and doing things for the right reasons, doing making a difference, figuring out what the actual life purpose is. I mean, through surfing, I can pretty much do anything and pretty much work with anybody. Pretty much do anything. But it's like what do we do? Who do we work with? How do we make a difference? How do we give back in the best way humanly possible? Or is it just focusing on the kids, focusing on being a good father, raising children that are contributors, or is it actually doing it ourselves? I think it's a balance. Again, do it being a good example, working on being a good example for the kids and for the world? And, yeah, it's all about balance.

That's what it is Balance. To find fulfillment, to find purpose and meaning, you need some struggle, and I think that that's probably why we pursue some of the things we pursue is that we're choosing a struggle to try to find that purpose, to find that meaning, because we know that through that struggle is really the only way we're going to get that enlightenment, learn those lessons that we need. But the balance piece is that's the hardest thing and I think our best lessons as dads often come from our mistakes. At least I know that's true for me. Where I'm like, the areas where I feel like I'm really good as a dad, it's like because I've made half a dozen mistakes and now I've really learned and honed my craft as a dad. Where do you feel you have a great focus on balance now? Where do you feel balance was a struggle for you in the past, especially with the kids, and maybe even too, like the idea that you're traveling so much and the kids are maybe going to school all over the world and we're dealing with different time zones. Where has balance been a challenge for you in the past and what were some of those hard lessons when it came to trying to balance family and serving?

The main balance is the presence and whether I'm in the home. We're super lucky. I'm here with them all the time, unless I'm in the water by myself, but not that often anymore. We're together 24, seven, 365, but I cannot be present, even though I'm right there with them, thinking about something else or focusing on something else, and not present. My biggest challenge is being present. I mean, I think about the world and like, what are we actually doing here? Why are we here? Does it even matter that we're here? Does it even matter what we're doing or how we're doing it, or just being a good human and being a good example and being conscious and doing good things? Does it even matter? And when you have to just go to your heart and figure out what feels right, and then you're like, okay, this my heart, I know my heart. Yes, we have to be contributors. Yes, we have to do good things. Yes, we have to make a difference. Yes, we have to try and, for lack of a better word, not save the world, not save Mother Earth or help Mother Earth, because she's going to be here as a matter of the human race being here or not. But then you think, okay, that feeling, that heart feeling, that I heartfelt feeling. Is that a condition, feeling Like, is that even real? So what do you think?

Yeah, that's a tough one. I think that my mind spins when I start going down that rabbit hole of purpose. And what is real? Is that feeling a connection to something bigger? Or is that just a fleeting feeling? That's just a normal part of being a human and it's going to be here one moment and gone the next, and it doesn't have any deeper meaning than that. I don't know if we're ever supposed to be able to answer that question, because I guess if we could answer the question, I guess we'd stop searching for answers, almost like if you like, I guess, to you like if you got the 100 foot wave, do you think surfing would change for you and you would feel content no longer seeking it? And I think maybe that's the tricky part with that question of purpose and meaning. And why are we here? Is that we aren't supposed to figure that out? Because once we do, we stop looking for the answers, and I think that that's where we find fulfillment in our life. Is that constant quest of search?

I was always focused on this hundred foot waves and that was my whole ultimate goal. Getting barreled on a hundred twenty foot wave was what I was looking for, but with hundred foot wave was the thing. You know, that's what we're all looking for to catch the hundred foot wave. And then, in 2012, I got the wave that the whole world sent out as the hundred foot wave and I was like, oh, what the hell? What are you guys doing to surf the world? The world, everybody said Gary got the hundred foot wave. And then I, shortly after I always try not to stay rigidly attached to the outcome, I try to let things morph to where they're going to go and then, like I don't know, a month or two months or six months or whatever it was, and I go every way I go people tell me I caught the hundred foot wave. The thing got the hundred foot wave. I'm like, all right, I'll run with it. I'm not going to get all weird and go no, I didn't catch it. I mean, I'll be there. What I do say is don't believe the media has fake news. That's what I always say. But then now, with the hundred foot wave series, now everybody, whether I caught it or not, I'm the hundred foot wave guy. So I'm like, wow, all right, we can run with this. This is cool. And we were like, no, don't call it a hundred foot wave. No, that's the lamest title ever. No, our surfers will never claim that my show's hundred foot. No, don't do that. And Chris and Joe came up with it. I'm not sure who won it. I mean, of course they watched the interview and all we talk about is a hundred foot wave and the hundred foot wave was searching for. So they were smart and they dialed a hundred foot wave against our. We wanted it to be road to. Nazarene like a spiritual thing. But yeah, so don't be too rigidly attached and run with it and flow. Let things flow. So I don't need to ride a hundred foot wave. I have no attachments to it. It's not something that I'm searching for. It's something that I want to be ready for.

When you think about these lessons of purpose and the way that you've talked about, I love the idea of like being prepared for when the moment comes. How do you think about teaching these lessons to your kids, like, how do you think about translating all that you've learned as a man, as a dad, down to your kids?

It's so challenging because I want my son to follow my footsteps. In a perfect world he would be a much greater contest surfer and surfer than me and I could really make that happen easily, because he's a freak, he's a natural, he's focused, he's really more calculated than me, way better than I was. But my wife and I agree with her just wants him to be a good human. So she doesn't want to push these sports or this or that, even though surfing is the best job in the world. But is there even a career for surfers these days? Is there going to be? I don't know. I mean, his name is Barrel. Pretty much all he has to do is get Barrel. So I'm not going to push him to surf contests unless he comes to me and wants to. I'm not going to push him to surf every day and unless he says dad, let's go surfing. He is in a spot where he loves surfing. Now he wants to surf. Nicole just wants to be a good human and a contributor. She is right 100% and I stand by that.

Something I'm always curious about too is I feel like I've made the biggest strides as a dad when I reflect on my own relationship with my own dad and I love my dad. But we've obviously had our struggles, especially growing up when I was an angsty teenager and pushing boundaries, and didn't really realize a lot of these things until later in reflecting that. But I know you had a really unique childhood. It's challenging at times, but I know that whether dads are present or not, great or not, they still influence the way we show up as dads today. So how do you think you would characterize your relationship with your dad growing up and how do you think that that relationship has shaped the way that you're now showing up as a dad?

A lot of my childhood. I blocked out somehow when I was younger I guess mostly just the challenging memories that I don't really want to remember. Somehow I blocked a lot of them out. My dad was a Latin major English teacher. He was a basketball coach at a boarding school a stoppage boarding school. We're renowned. Then my mom had us move to Berkeley and then to a hippie commune and then back to Berkeley and then at 11, she forced us to move to Hawaii, far from my father, and she left my father and he didn't want her to leave, but she wanted to keep going and she moved him from here to there to there and he just finally said I'm not moving anymore and then it ended. She still regrets it to this day. She wishes she had stayed with him and she has an amazing husband. The guy's amazing, but there was a lot of amazing things that my dad was just always loving and kind and supportive and present, when he's a very, very calm, cool, collective, present person and very intelligent. And not a lot of my dad rubbed off on me. Unfortunately, all the good that my dad has, I didn't get most of it and a lot of it's from my mom, and I'm definitely a very challenging person to be around at times if I'm not real happy and I'm not doing what I want to be doing, and a lot of that comes from my mom. Yeah, and my dad always says stink before you talk. And my mom never thinks before she talks and I kind of go towards my mom more. The one thing I remember dad always saying yeah, he he's in Florida now and he's not doing that. Well, he's him Got a stroke, so he still cruise him, but not nothing like he was Definitely deteriorating sad. Yeah, yeah, you have nothing. My dad was awesome. Yeah, I just have a lot of good, amazing memories and I wish I was more like him actually. Yeah, more, and rubbed off on me. I don't have regrets, but it would have been nice by me was around him more. I would have got more of him, sure.

Yeah. Yeah, I'm sorry to hear he's not doing well. I think that's. It's hard to see our parents get older and go through health struggles. My dad had a heart attack relatively young and I was sort of like a shock to the system. So I definitely definitely feel you on the. You know the parents growing older and dealing with health stuff. But you know, I think it's it sounds between you know your dad, and their presence and their calmness. It sounds like you do have some great models, at least of Folks to help work on the, the practice of being more presence.

For my mom. She was, you know. She gave us a lot of freedom. Freedom pretty much shaped us, made it to where we had to make our own way in this world. We had the we had to for lack of a better word fight for what we wanted, or scrap, or we had to figure it out. We had to make it happen. We had to align with the right people. We had to do the right things. We had to focus. We had to be focused. We had, we had to make it happen or nothing was gonna happen. And Without that freedom and without that lack of what we wanted and what we thought we needed, or we pretty much have what we needed, but we definitely didn't have what we wanted. And if we wanted something, we had to get. We had to make it happen. We had to, we had to get it somehow. And that was all from mom, and she moved us to Hawaii where Everything fell in place and all of our dreams came true. So mom's amazing in that aspect, it's just very unconventional, very different. Yeah, very interesting. Yes, oh, I just gave them to God. I left it all up to God.

You're like mom. If God gave us waves, then I believe in God, so that's, that's my connection.

I'm underwater getting bounded, even, probably still today, I don't know. Please, god, help me?

Yeah, I don't.

I don't. We're talking to the papaya or the toaster poster. Please help me toaster.

Oh God Amazing well, garrett, I really appreciate your time, man. I'm so excited for for all the the different areas we got to cover today. And I'm just curious, like one last thing you know what, what are you working on now, what? What's next in terms of? I know you're, you're doing a lot for the environment, like, what kind of projects are you getting into that that you know our top of mind for you outside of serving and dad life?

Well, we're always working on being plastic, single use plastic free, which is super challenging, but we would do work on it. We really work on it. In a perfect world, my perfect self, never will use single use pop plastic. I would say out of a thousand bottles of water, maybe one is a plastic bottle, randomly, when there's no water and you just got to drink some water, or if you're in the third-world country and there's no way to get clean drinking water and you didn't do take the time to get glass bottles. We have a foundation set up, the McNamara Foundation, waves of life, where we take children surfing, underprivileged children. Here in Portugal, the up atop of the lighthouse, there's a boys home where there's foster children and refugees and there's probably like from 20 to 40 of them all year long and we take them surfing or hiking or something in nature once a week to one, for, you know, coping skills and and mainly, sharing the Mother nature with them in one way or another, preferably surf therapy, getting them to fall in love with the word. How can we expect them to even care or want to nurture or, you know, care about the environment without without being in love with it? And and I share with them my story from the beginning, like when I had nothing and and actually was eating out of trash cans when I was like five, with a cult called the Christ family and and so I share that story with them. And then so we have, they were whoa, this guy had a pretty artist beginning maybe harder than we do actually. And so then I share with them that everything's possible, it doesn't matter where we come from, and and I try to inspire them to go after their goals and write down what they love doing and write down how to make that their career and and that works really well, and we, we bond and we do some goal setting and and then we see where they are the year and a few years later. Sometimes we even write the things down and bury it and we go dig it back up. Um, then Hawaii super challenging, we have right where I learned how to surf. There's a. There's a home there for sex traffic teens the rehab center in the United States. There's Hundreds of thousands of sex traffic teens. There's only six. Uh, is it six hundred? I think six hundred beds in rehabs facilities out six hundred beds in the United States in the rehab facilities, 30 of them are on the North Shore of Hawaii, where I learned how to surf, so we just surf therapy with them. It's, it's crazy. It's these girls have never known a man that they can trust. They don't have any. They see men, they run, they hide, they scared, they're scared and it's, it's crazy. And we're working with them to be able to cope and live in in normal, a normal life in society. And it's who sense real. It's, yeah, it's challenging. It's yeah, it's sad, it's heavy. So we do that with the foundation as well. We're working with the Pathwater company and they have reusable aluminum cans. So the biggest challenge with the water bottles of plastic water is that Everybody buys them and they throw them and end up in the rivers or in the landfills and they're gonna be there forever and they'll end up in the bottom of the ocean and end up just in. It's terrible what's going on with the plastic bottle, but there's no solution unless you have refills Stations everywhere. So, right, I mean, my biggest thing is every business in the world, by law, should have to have a refill station at their Place of work, at their business, for everybody who shows up to refill. And Then the path has already got the water bottles, they're everywhere. You get them. You can reuse them for a lifetime, or you can, at least you're gonna reuse them once or twice, if not 10, 20, 30 times. But then it's aluminum, so you can recycle as well, and it's not plastic, it's gonna end up, it's aluminum. So, yeah, we just started, we aligned with this company called spot insurance, which is Amazing. Anywhere you go, I think in the world, you can get not a ski lift, I want insurance. I'm going up a lift right now. Okay, if you nice, insurance, all the car, what else? Oh, I want to show my board. Oh, I want to show my jet ski. Oh, there's that. The other thing. It's like Uber of insurance or Insurance all a cart for a very small amount as you're going to do the activity. It's right, yeah, I love that yeah, but insurance.

That's so smart. Yeah, you see the conditions and you're like I need insurance for this.

That's awesome and you can get a bunch of other things on the, on the, at that same moment.

Yeah.

Whether it's your body or board Colleges, I don't know yeah some sort of recognition? Yeah, yeah don't quote me on that, but I think you can actually do that.

Yeah, folks, you go to the website and get the full list.

Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, and then you know, mercedes has always been an amazing supporter of us and they're going fully electric, so we've been very fortunate that they support our projects and we've been working with them for a long time. And then, yeah, we've been having a lot of fun with a lot of the companies. It's really really. The HBO has been incredible. Portugal incredible the world, the whole world. It's just been so incredible the way that everybody's enjoying the series and all. I mean I don't feel like any different than anybody else. I don't feel like I'm an inspiring person, but people are getting inspired and that was the goal, like my wife's. Like we're not doing this unless we can spread some good messages and hopefully inspire some people, and so, I don't know, somehow it's working and everybody's loving it and everybody's sending us incredible, beautiful heart-to-heart messages that really inspire me to continue this journey and do our best to do things in a good way. You know it's mostly my wife. My wife is my biggest influence and I'm so lucky that I have heard my life and that she's such a selfless, amazing human that doesn't stop in a good way for the world, for everything she represents. She's here for the world.

Yeah, man, I don't know where I'd be without my wife. I hear you 100% in so many ways where you know, especially when it comes to the kids and making sure that we're focused on the right values, focused on all the things that they need, but also just like making sure that our family is trying to go out into the world and make it better and be good people and be that positive influence. So, yeah, I hear you Wives are so great at keeping us in check but allowing us to go out and do amazing things out in the world when we leave the house.

So but I honestly think if they were running the world, it would be a much better place.

Oh yeah absolutely Well, Garrett, I got to say thank you again. So much for your time. I can hear the sounds of joy and chaos, so I'll let you get back to it, but I really appreciate you taking time to chat today All right.

Thank you so much for your patience and your understanding on everything. Thank you.

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