In many ways my trip down the Selway River taught me a lot. At some point, when you are so good it’s something you get so cocky that you need a disaster like this to happen. Thankfully I didn’t die.

The same thing happened while I was riding Moto cross. I ended up in the hospital, pretty close to death. After that, I got good. You know, you get smoother.

Kayaking, I was further along in age so I didn’t recover psychologically as well as I had from that earlier moto cross accident.

My life has been surprisingly tragedy-free. There are down moments; when your parents die, that is tragic. But they lived long lives, and one of them lived a good life. I’ve had very few deaths of friends or loved ones; a few cancer deaths and that sort of thing.

Many of those experiences, including the one of the near-drowning, point to the value of living in a moment. Not for the moment, but in a moment. That’s what Aikido is all about; being here and now. Being in the present. Being totally focused on being, not focused on what’s next, what’s tomorrow… There is only this moment.

When you’re paddling for always, there is nothing else on your mind. You’re just going. When you catch the wave, you have arrived, you are there. It’s brief, it’s fleeting, and you’ll never have that wave again.