How to meet your hero

At a certain point, it stops being a silly thought exercise. I found myself having a conversation with the world's #1 surfer of 2024 just last week.

What would you say if you met your hero? It’s not a silly thought exercise at a certain point in life. After you’ve committed to doing the things you love to do, you get closer to coming across your hero and other remarkable people doing those things too. Then one day, it happens.

Last week I met the world’s best surfer of 2024 on the women’s side, Caitlin Simmers. It was just two days after she won her first world title. It was just her second year competing on the championship tour. At 18 years old, she was the youngest woman surfer to win a world title.

I was starstruck.

I flew to Southern California with my wife to try to see the final championship event in person but we were one day late. So we spent our first night in Oceanside, Simmers’ hometown, watching the recording of the live stream on the Roku TV in our AirBnb. We cheered with astonishment as Simmers won her h…