How paddleboarding builds self confidence

'The minute I stood up on my paddleboard and looked across Derwentwater I knew this was something very special. For the first time in a long time I felt like a warrior not a worrier. Worry had always been my default position and even more so during my late 40s and early 50s.'

The experience I’m describing happened on 24 September 2016 near Nichol End Marine on Derwentwater in the Lake District. I was fifty-one and taking my first paddleboard lesson with Bo from Lake District Paddleboarding. Having injured my knee in the January of that year, I booked a SUP lesson to help build my strength – physically, emotionally and mentally. It was a moment that changed my life forever.

Over the last nine years, paddleboarding has brought me friendships, community, creativity, courage, joy, purpose, a new career and yes, self confidence.

In this blog, I’ll share how this has happened for me, for other paddlers in my new book Adventures on the Water – The power of paddleboarding to change lives and why and how SUP can benefit you.

Before I do, let’s look at where my self-belief was in 2016.

A couple of months after that first lesson, I decided I wanted to paddleboard the Leeds Liverpool Canal, a distance of 128 miles and one hundred and one locks across the north of England. I was told that it sounded ‘logistically complex, quite boring and too difficult for a woman of my age.’ I was only fifty-one!

Today I would not put any store by these remarks, but back then I lacked the self-confidence to believe in my goal. I put the dream away for three years while I continued to build up my SUP experience and skills.

Finally in January 2019, having been to the funerals of a number of friends in their late 40s or early 50s, I realised that life is really short and precious and if you have even the tiniest spark of a dream, you owe it to yourself to try and make that dream come true.

So in July 2019 I set off along the Leeds Liverpool Canal and became the first woman to SUP coast to coast from Liverpool to Goole, 162 miles, one hundred and ten locks and many swing bridges. Since then I have written three books, launched a podcast and a film about the adventure, 'Brave Enough – A Journey Home to Joy', by Frit Films, has been screened at prestigious adventure festivals.

Jo Moseley. © Jumpy James.

So how did SUP help build my confidence and how can it help you too?

Here are just a few of the ways:

Learning and mastering a new skill as a an adult

Most of us start paddleboarding as an adult and learning something new at this age is incredibly empowering. You have pushed yourself beyond your comfort zone and realised you are more capable than you thought you were. Small wins – standing for the first time, being able to stop and turn your board – build up and create a positive feedback loop of self-esteem. In Adventures on the Water, Shilpa Rasaiah shares how she created a 165-mile challenge to paddle from London to her home club along the Grand Union Canal in her 60s despite her initial misgivings and having never done anything like it before. I know paddlers who overcame their fear of open water to start SUP as it looked so much fun. They now regularly paddle, swim and snorkel because they faced their fear and did it anyway.

Movement Builds Hope

In her book, The Joy of Movement, Kelly McGonigal explains how being physically active impacts brain chemicals that ‘give you energy, alleviate worry and help you bond with others.’ Regular exercise she says ‘remodels the physical structure of your brain to make it more receptive to joy and social connection.’ Scientists call the proteins that are released into the blood stream myokines or ‘hope molecules’. More hope, less worry, more self-confidence.

Building Self-Reliance and Trusting Our Judgement

Paddleboarding means we need to learn about winds, tides, river flow and judge our own ability on the day. If conditions change, we need to adapt and decide our best course of action – do we dig deep to get to the end of the lake or call it a day? All these bring a sense of self reliance and trust to build up our self-belief which then translates into our daily lives. Sometimes it’s a case of ignoring our inner critic that says we can’t do something and sometimes it’s realising the conditions are not right. In Adventures on the Water, Craig Sawyer and Scott Innes show how trusting themselves, each other and their shared goal helped them become the first British paddleboarders to complete the Yukon1000 challenge.

Jo Moseley. © Jumpy James.

Blue Mind Theory

In his book, Blue Mind: How Water Makes You Happier, More Connected and BetterAt What You Do, Wallace J Nichols writes about the Blue Mind, ‘the mildly meditative state people fall into when they are near, in, under or on water.’ Wellbeing practitioner Dr Catherine Kelly agrees, explaining that proximity to water is an antidote to daily stress, regulates our anxiety and leaves us feeling more calm, peaceful and happy. In Adventures on the Water, Podcast host Simon Hutchinson shares more about how Blue Mind helps him on the water. 

Connecting with Nature – Tiny Details to the Bigger Perspective

A report shared by the Mental Health Foundation shares how being in nature and connecting to green and blue spaces can benefit our mental health. Research shows that people who are more connected to with nature are usually happier in life and more likely to report feeling their lives are worthwhile. Like Clare Osborn in her essay, we might pause to be mindful of tiny details like a mother and her baby ducks or noticing glimmers – a cue to bring you back to joy, safety and comfort. By the same token, paddling in a Lake District lake and mountain landscape can help bring perspective to our own problems.

Community and Encouragement

As Daisy Best ‘Queen of the Canals’ shares in her story, community plays a huge role in SUP, encouraging us to believe in ourselves and cheering us to the finish line of our goals and dreams. In Adventures on the Water, SUP Yoga teacher Kathy Marston talks about the community she has created with her classes, people connecting not only to yoga and nature but to each other too. The SUP community is a great example of the phrase ‘we rise by lifting others’.

Purpose and Power

Bringing purpose to your paddling can have a hugely positive impact. For me, adding litterpicking and fundraising for The Wave Project and 2 Minute Foundation on my coast to coast in 2019 boosted my motivation to reach Goole and encouraged me to succeed when I doubted myself. Brendon Prince’s circumnavigation of the coastline to raise awareness of drowning, Cal Major’s commitment to ocean advocacy and Seaful, the charity she founded and Adya Misra’s People of Colour Paddle community are great examples of adding purpose to our paddle.

Dean Dunbar. 

Redefining What’s Possible

One of the greatest honours with Adventures on the Water  is sharing the personal essays of people who are redefining the limits of what’s possible. Registered blind Dean Dunbar took on an ocean crossing from North Uist to St Kilda, Cathy Miles takes us on her sunrise paddle after a stroke and Will Behenna talks of his first solo paddle on the River Stour 35 years after a car accident that crushed his spine. So many of the paddlers in Adventures on the Water  show us that we are stronger, braver and more resilient than we think.

Paddleboarding is FUN!

One of the simplest ways to build our confidence is having fun and SUP is just that! Learning to laugh if we fall in because we are trying to push ourselves to try something new or not care how messy we might then look frees us from the burden of other people’s opinions. Feeling like we are welcome on the water whatever our age or ability can help us feel reassured and confident we belong.

Tips on How Can Become Your Own SUP Warrior:

a) Allow yourself to be a beginner – take that first lesson.
b) Ensure you have safety covered – location, kit (buoyancy aid, leash, mobile phone etc), your own skills such as self-rescue and understanding weather conditions.
c) Plan your route – your back-up plan and strategy if conditions change and let someone know where you are.
d) Find your SUP community – join a good SUP group or go with an instructor led club or be part of an Aqua Paddle event.
e) Explore new places*, bodies of water or times you paddle – a longer stretch of a canal, a lifeguarded beach, a river paddle with a local guide or go for a sunrise paddle.
f) Upgrade your skills or start a new discipline like SUP surf, racing or White Water SUP.
g) Add purpose with a litter pick or fundraising challenge.
h) Introduce someone new to the Joy of SUP so they can have their own adventure on the water.

Above all, remember:

• No-one starts out an expert – we are all beginners at some point.
• Every journey begins with that very first step.
• Every adventure – big or small – happens one stroke at a time.
  

I hope you enjoy reading the incredible stories in Adventures on the Water and it will inspire you to have your own. I would love to hear about them! Please message me on Instagram @jomoseley or @thejoyofsuppodcast_ or jomoseley@yahoo.com I look forward to hearing from you! See you on the water!

*** If you are looking for new places to paddleboard, I can highly recommend my first two books Stand-Up Paddleboarding in Great Britain – Beautiful places toPaddleboard in England, Scotland and Wales and Stand-Up Paddleboarding in theLake District – Beautiful places to paddleboard in Cumbria also from Vertebrate Publishing.