Lessons Learned: Self-Care and Mindfulness Through Intense Adventure

Hi Everyone, Sam and I went on another offshore adventure this year and we did survive! I had an epic adventure, with many fascinating learnings on mindset, trust and letting go!

In total, we had a 1000 nautical mile (nm) adventure and in the end, found coming back to dry land surreal after around 8 days at sea.

This race and adventure were intense, with barely a few hours of sleep in 8 days, it is a school of self-care and mindfulness with some stark lessons which we can all apply in our everyday lives.

Sam and I the morning after the start

So what happened? We entered the Drheam Cup a 600 nm race, starting from Cherbourg and ending in La Trinity sur Mer. First, we had to sail from Southampton to Cherbourg for the start. The race was slightly shortened to 460nm due to light winds, it had a bit of everything with a massive squall at the start, tactical medium to light wind upwind sailing, tides and tidal effects close to land, and big high pressure weather systems to navigate. Racing toe to toe with really great sailors for 4 days. We finished 8th in the double-handed class, 3rd British boat and second in our type of boat. I was so lucky to sail with my good friend Sam, not only is he an amazing sailor, but he never gives up no matter what, always looks out for you and is so positive and smiling in every moment that you can’t help but have a laugh. Overall, we were really happy espe,cially considering that we managed to escape the clutches of a high-pressure ridge which others we were next to didn’t and who finished 14+ hours after us. However, this was tight intense racing for 4 days and there are plenty of learnings and areas where our decisions cost us. There was no time for rest and celebration, after a night's sleep, we had a 3-day sail home where we were exhausted and started to find our limits.

Semi awake semi in la la land sailing started to creep in.

Our 1000nm adventure

Lesson 1: you can control your mindset, but it takes time to prepare.

Looking back on it, one of the main takeaways was mindset. It took me a while to work out, why I found this race harder than the Fastnet race last year which was longer, with big storms to navigate. Mindset is key, in this race I let my mind get wrapped up in the race focusing on performance, positioning and tactics. Whereas in the Fastnet it was much more on survival, and enjoying the thrill. This racing stress wore me down and only by day 2 I was suffering from tiredness. Part of that was the feeling of overwhelm and stress I had in life going into the race, an overall sense of unpreparedness leaked into my mindset.

Key lesson for life, is you have the ability to control your mindset, take the time to prepare, focus on enjoying the moment and having a laugh.

Sam trying to wake me up

Lesson 2: Trust

Trust! Another key learning. In this race we had so many tactical decisions to make all the time, the key was to communicate well the game plan with my sailing partner Sam and trust in him to make the decisions when it was my turn to sleep. We started both being awake for key decisions to manage and talk them through together, but the relentless nature of the race meant we had to take them alone otherwise we would never recover on sleep, this meant trust. We lost on a couple of decisions at the start but gained back again through trusting in each other.

Another beautiful sunset on our journey

Lesson 3: Switch off and let go!

Switch off and let go! In this race, I struggled to let go when trying to sleep. It was so hard to go from full race mode on minute to lying in the bunk asleep the next. But I needed to sleep! My mind was a constant mess of decisions to come, decisions we had made, listening and feeling to the boat, worrying if the boat going as fast as it could. This meant that sleep even though exhausted didn’t come easily. You pay for that though and later in the race you aren’t thinking clearly. Incorporating mediation techniques to calm the mind down from full race mode to sleep is something I will try for next time, and reminds me how important it is to unwind the mind before bed each day.

Prepare your mind, trust in yourself and others, and wind down for sleep!

Short Video of the Adventure

Calm sunset in the high pressure ridge