Mick Fanning - Riding The Waves of Loss | The Imperfects

My name is Emily and I'm a psychologist and regular guest on The Imperfects.

I was proudly born and raised on Wurundjeri country and now live, work and raise my own children on the lands of the Wajak Nunga people.

I'm inspired by the strength and endurance of the world's oldest living culture.

We at The Imperfects pay homage to traditions of story and in particular its role in healing when we share and create space for stories on this podcast.

Together with the imperfects I acknowledge the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation as the traditional owners of the land on which this podcast was recorded and extend my respects to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

I acknowledge this land always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

People might look at me and and say yeah you've been through some hell and yeah I have But there are other people out in the world that have lost as much or more than me.

Like, I look at my parents.

I'm like, if I lost one of my kids, that's the scariest thing in the world.

And they've lost three kids.

We're all imperfect.

And on this podcast, I'll be chatting with a variety of interesting people who are willing to make themselves vulnerable by sharing their own struggles and imperfections.

I'm Stu van Carlenberg from The Resilience Project.

And I'm Ryan Shelton from My Mum.

And I'm Josh, from Hugh's Mum.

And this is The Imperfects.

Well, I'm not a surfer.

But, one, I wish I was.

How cool would that be?

Two, if I was a surfer, I'd be...

..10 times more excited than I already am, which is infinitely excited.

Well, it's 10 times infinity.

Infinity. That's right.

A bit of maths. Yeah.

A bit of maths for you.

that. But you weren't expecting that here.

No, it wasn't, but I'm grateful.

Thank you. Um, Mick Fanning day.

Yeah, Mick Fanning day.

4. And episode one for the season.

Yeah, that's a great start with Mick Fanning.

He's unbelievable. I wanted so much too.

We spent the summer holidays down the beach and I so wanted to have some kind of surfing anecdote to kick up this episode with and really to be honest, I mean, I didn't surf at all.

So that's probably didn't help the cause.

No, I think I've definitely dropped the Mick Fannin name a few times over the summer holidays, because if I ever speak to people about the podcast, they'll, usually the first thing that says like got any big names coming up.

Got any, yeah. What are you got coming up?

Any, any interesting people?

I was like, well, we've got lots of cool people coming up.

But Mick Fannin coming up.

Oh really? Yep. Mick Fannin.

You can talk about Punching the shark?

Yep. No, he does talk about that, talk about other stuff as well.

But but but yeah, I've definitely used it to my advantage.

Yeah. I was just searching for some kind of anecdote.

All summer holidays on the beach.

I mean, I did see a funny conversation take place at the beach.

And that's something you hang on.

Is this about McFanning or is this no just beaches in general?

Trying link to today's episode.

I saw I was at a beach.

No, I was a really lovely moment.

I saw the biggest ever disconnect between Gen Z and an elderly lady in just, I was, it was at a cafe at the beach and the girl, it was busy and she was quite frantic taking people's orders.

And this lady went to order her coffee and the lady would have been probably early nineties, I think, and she ordered her coffee.

And then the girl, the gen Z he would have had probably 17 -18 said, and your name please, just for the coffee.

And the, and the lady said, um, Bethel.

And the gen Z girl said, Oh, sick name.

A sick name. And poor Bethel goes, I beg your pardon?

Yeah, sick name, she goes, my name is.

And this lady stood there just and then the Genz E -girl didn't even realise that she'd like what she'd done to this old lady.

She's turned around and she said, can we get that toastie up to table for please?

Next, thanks. And just looked over Bethel's shoulder and poor Bethel wandered off and stood in the corner completely bemused.

I mean, to be fair, it is a pretty sick name.

Like objectively speaking, it's pretty sick name.

Bethel. You don't hear many new Bethels.

There's not many Bethels come and throw you.

Maybe that's on the way back.

Oh gosh. It was a wonderful moment.

It was so good to watch.

But anyway, that is my beach anecdote.

Good. Okay, um, Bridge file that in the beach anecdote section of our podcast.

It happened in a cafe near a beach.

It wasn't even on a beach.

No it was, it was the kiosk at The Beach.

Technically, it does.

I had no shoes on and my feet were in the sand when I ordered a beach kiosk.

Oh no, very good. Nice and short, and good to mention Gen Z.

It was sweet. And good to mention Gen Z.

Yeah, very good to mention Gen Z.

And sick anecdote actually, while we are throwing out sick anecdote.

But Mick Fanning, we did have this conversation with him at the end of last year and I've just been thinking about it so much.

He didn't know a lot about the podcast, it's better so when he came in and why would he?

But it was really nice to see him work it out pretty quickly.

And I mean, what he's been through in his life, I don't even understand how someone works there or navigates that.

He... Well, it was so, it was so raw.

And I really love it when we have someone on the show who completely, um, not ex, not exceeds, but like goes against what your expectations are or your perceptions are of who they are.

And I didn't know much about Mick at all now we're obviously really, really close.

But I didn't know much about him before.

And yeah, the way he talks about what he's gone through is, I was not expecting.

So, as you're about to hear, the extraordinarily tragic part of Mick's story is that his three brothers have all died.

We do go into a little bit of detail with the death of his brother, Sean, and then we don't really talk about the details.

To be really honest, the reason we don't is I, as an interviewer, just got quite nervous an apprehensive about asking someone to...

I just found it felt like a really hard question to ask to ask more details on his other brother's passing.

Yeah, I was the same.

And also he speaks so beautifully about the way he connects to his brothers now that they've passed and I no longer hear it felt a bit icky or something to then go, oh, how like, go into the details of exactly what happened.

Yeah, it just didn't feel right in the moment.

But he is so generous in how a total talks about.

Unbelievable. Unbelievable.

And so I guess now we just want to give you the details of what happened.

A bit of context to, to what's happened to Mick's life because it really paints a picture of what an incredibly resilient and um, extraordinary man he really is.

So in 1998, Mick lost his older brother, Sean.

Um, they were at a party after a surfing competition that Mick had done really well in.

And Mick decided to walk home from the party and his older brother, Shawn, was in a car and as a car accident, he was killed that night.

Another one of his older brothers, Peter died in 2015 of a heart complication.

And then in 2024, Ed, so very recently Ed, his brother...

Was he in March last year?

In March last year, I believe cut his foot on some coral and became infected and ended up causing a cardiac issue and he passed away.

So he's, I mean, I shudder to think what to the places he has been with, with all that, and I think about his parents as well, but my gosh.

Um, so yeah, just want to give you the context on, on why we just, filmic is so extraordinary?

Yeah. He's so sort of, uh, laconic and iconic in the way he talks.

It's, it's surprising to see that he's gone through that much tragedy so close, uh, with the way he talks, but there's so much vulnerability and honesty.

It's such an incredible chat.

Yeah. And what Sean throw for me was just, just what an incredible example of what humanity should be about and how much he gives back to - I was gonna say his community, but just the world, he really gives back so much on so many levels.

So we hope you enjoy this chat with Mick.

We love him. We would like to claim to be friends with him, but Yeah, we're working on it.

I can only imagine how many people he told over the holidays about coming on our podcast He must be in a really milking that Just like we were.

Alright, Mick Fanning.

Well it's not every day, it'd be weird if it was, but it's not every day that we get to meet one of the best people who has ever done the thing that they do.

Yeah. And today we're very, very lucky to have Mick Fanning right here.

Howdy. And you respond to that.

Nick, I mean, this is, I'm so excited.

Thanks. No, thanks for having me.

Three time, three time world champion, so for those of you who everyone knows, I don't need to say that.

I mean, I'm sort of like, I don't know how or when to ask about the shark, and I feel like, you know— Rip off Band -Aid mean.

But it's like we'll get to it at some point.

But it's like, if I was cheating and listen to Mick Fanning, I was like, dog about the shark.

I just feel like you've had so many dreams come true, but you've also had so many nightmares come to reality and it's just, it's extraordinary.

It's an incredible journey.

So I guess we'll get to them all in good time.

I think for me, I'd love to start with your childhood and hear about what it was like for you as a kid growing up.

I have this picture in my head of, like, when I picture, I'm picturing blonde hair and surfing and just mayhem.

He is pretty much my aunt.

It's like where it all started.

My parents are migrants from Ireland and England.

They moved over, they were part of the, what they call the ten pound poms.

So their flight was ten pounds.

They only had to have a hundred pounds in each bank account.

Must have been Jetstar or something.

Maybe Ryan Air. Yeah it reminds me.

And so they had my sister at the time, so they flew over, landed in Perth, and then they decided, my dad was like, nah, we're not living here.

Drove across the Nullarbor and set up in Penrith and had the rest of us boys.

Where were you starting the Order of Things?

I'm the last of five.

Nice, OK. Yeah yes, I'm the youngest.

And when I was young, my parents got divorced.

And then I moved up to Coffs Harbor with the rest of my brothers my sister.

Do you have memories of the divorce at all?

No, no it wasn't I was still pretty young like the only thing I really remember from the Penwood days was playing on the trampoline going to the shops and watching Roger Ramjet on the t -shirt.

That's all pretty good.

Starting in pretty good.

I remember Roger Ramjet.

Yeah, yeah. So life sort of started in Coffs Harbour for me.

and yeah, from there, that's when my brothers fell in love with surfing.

Because I was the youngest, they were like, you've got to come.

We're not, someone's got to look after you and you'll come to the beach.

I'm like, okay, cool.

And they pretty much, yeah, I was baptism by fire and surfing.

They just took me out and said, get in.

And then from there we moved up to Ballina and there for the rest of my primary school days.

My brothers got right into surfing then.

My middle brother, Ed, he was like chasing the pro -junior tour and try to make a career out of it.

So surfing at this point I'm guessing surfing was just in your household, everything.

Everything. Yeah. Our house was so like an unofficial clubhouse.

My mum always had this theory, like we didn't have the most money in the world, but she always said, if I have a nice house and it's near the beach, my boys would be out of trouble.

Yeah, it didn't work for some of them, but we'd have like, like, at any given time, we'd have anywhere between 10 and 20 kids in our house, just stacking their boards there, all going surfing together.

And it was fun. It was really, really fun and they're really good memories.

And being the youngest, I was sort of looked after not only by my brothers, but, um, the older boys that were around and, um, sort of learned the, the hierarchy and, you know, who to respect and who to talk shit to.

And what's the age difference?

My sister's 12 years older.

My next brother was nine years, then six and then three.

Okay. Oh wow. Very consistent.

So, yeah. It must've been good, few years, everything.

Never ask my mum and dad that one.

Every three years let's get together.

I'll come home from the pub.

It just sounds like.

Heaven. It just sounds so good.

Like we, so Josh and I are brothers and we grew up in Leafy Ball on the suburbs of Melbourne and we knew a guy across the road sort of called Michael but yeah it was like sometimes I'd say good day to him and that felt pretty cool.

I mean, we had an obsession with a different...

like our obsession was cricket and that was like just everything we did in our house.

And like the playing back our cricket with you is some of the happiest memories of my life.

But we never had, I mean if you...

if I just could just like multiply that with more, more people coming around to do it, it would just be heaven.

Yeah. Yeah. It was good times.

It was good times. Probably stress mum out a bit, but no.

It was... it was...

it was great. I feel like that and I don't have kids, but whenever I'm at a place that's near a beach and I say like kids playing at the beach I was saying like what a if you can like what a genius move to move somewhere near a beach because for kids it's like there's always an activity.

Yeah it's it's special like I mean I'm in that realm right now taking my kids down the beach and it's so cool to watch them explore not only the sand and everything around like It's like rocks, crabs, worms, burying toys, and then getting my son on the board and going out and he's asking about, you know, whales, sharks, dolphins, fish, like when we're trying to catch waves, it's really cool to sort of share that world with them.

To be honest, those days make me way more excited than whatever I did growing up in the surfing world.

It was like, this is it.

This is my wild title dream right here.

Really? Is that what you expected?

Did you expect to love being a dad so much?

Yeah, I don't know.

Like, as... You know, my mates have probably had kids a lot earlier than what I did.

And, you know, I see the joy in them and stuff and they're like, it's the best feeling in the world.

And I'm like, well, shit, I surf.

like I get to travel around the world, I do some pretty freaking cool things and that to me is the best thing in the world.

And then when I had my son and it was like, alright, I get it now.

It's like, you know, the best thing in surfing is to get barreled.

And it's like, imagine putting all the barrels together in one that you ever had in one day.

And then Yeah. The, the Stoke level is just out of this world and you can't not smile for weeks.

It's awesome. That's beautiful.

Yeah. Until you get really tired and then you don't know what's going on.

Which is when you get dumped, that's when you feel like you're made up pretty badly.

Wipe out. Yeah. For me to be honest, this is my experience of both surfing and parenting more than anything, but, um, were you, were you and your brothers competitive or was it just so is surfing more about.

You go out and you sort of, run your own race.

Oh no, we were so competitive.

Yeah. With everything.

It was pretty funny, like two of my brothers had brown hair and then me and my middle brother, we were the, you know, pure blonde.

And so I would fight my brother that was three years older.

He would punch me and then The next brother would come in, he would punch him.

And then the oldest brother would come in and punch him.

And by the end of it, the two middle ones were crying.

And me and the other one were laughing.

When you say punch, like how serious are the fights?

Yeah. A few trips to hospitals, stitches and stuff like that.

Yeah. Yeah. We were, we were yeah, there was no holding back.

And it was just your mum looking after you.

Yeah. That's a life for your mum.

Yeah. We put her through hell.

But you know, she's, she's a strong woman.

We call her the lioness.

So yeah, she's very protective of her pride.

And yeah, she was, she was extremely strong woman and yeah, she didn't take shit.

Well, I don't think you could raise none of you guys.

No. That's Liz, isn't it your mum's.

Liz, yeah. Yeah, I've seen a couple of interviews with her in her live.

She's incredible to listen to as well.

Just yeah, but I'll get to more of that a bit later on.

So when did you realise that you were really fucking good at surfing?

Yeah, that's another funny story.

It was almost like a sliding doors effect.

We had just moved to the Gold Coast.

And I was so into soccer like I love soccer.

How old are you at 10?

I was 12. Right. And we won the state titles as as young kids in soccer and stuff like that.

So I was all about soccer.

Jeez! my dream was to go and play in England and all that kind of stuff and when we moved to the Gold Coast we went to sign up for soccer and we ended up going the wrong day no one was there.

I was gutted but my brother Sean was in the car and he was actually going to go to the beach straight after and he was gonna meet the guys from Quicksilver to Potentially get sponsored and why I went surfing as well, and I've come in before him and Two guys came up and they're like Hey, we're from quicksilver.

I was like oh you looking for my brother as if that knew who I was and they're like what your brother and Yeah, and they're like we're gonna sponsor him and we'll sponsor you too.

I was like what how cool is that I've never gotten anything free from soccer And that's the day you were supposed to be signing up to soccer?

Yeah. And then, uh, yeah, never went to, never went and signed up at soccer and just surfed ever since.

And Quicksilver's soccer division isn't big from what I know about Quicksilver.

Yeah. Yeah. There's a few sock plays that love surfing, but yeah that's about as close it gets.

Between the head of like Australian football Federation right now listening going, oh the fuck.

Never take a day off.

Wow that's incredible sliding door.

And also at 12 years old to get a sponsorship from Quicksilver is mad.

Yeah, it was so mad.

As I said before we didn't have the most money in the world like my mum would go and buy clothes from like Target or whatever and she would save all the billabong badges or the Quicksilver badges and she would sew them on for us so that would be a good fit in.

And so when I've got a free t -shirt and a free pair of body I say fuck yeah.

So what did the sponsorship...

is it just free clothes, is that how it works?

So at that point, it was just, yeah, I think my allowance over summer and winter, you get two packs and you had 500 bucks worth of clothes and wetsuits.

Geez, that's a lot of in the 90s.

Early 90s. Yeah, it was, yeah.

early mid nineties.

500 would go a long way.

Yeah. I had like four shirts and three shorts and two weddings.

I was pumped. Yeah.

I'm just pitching this guy at high school like a year.

Seven kids sponsored by, yeah.

It's like, boy, here's the coolest guy in the school.

Yeah. Maybe for about three seconds.

Cause then Dean Morrison and Joel Parkinson came to school and at your school.

Yeah. So, uh, yeah.

And they were getting paid to go surfing.

And so I was like, oh shit, I'm a level below those guys.

It's a pretty good serving school.

It's unbelievable. This made me realise you've spoken on the podcast before about when you played like Ozkiq, footy.

Sure. And you were like.

This is a not really comparable story.

No, no, no. No, but I was just saying.

Let's hear it out. It's a random thing to bring up.

But I've realised he's - This is a time that Quicksilver didn't sponsor me.

But he's like, mix lived your dream as a child, that dream you had of, like, playing Oz kick and someone like a, the football from the AFL, it comes to watch going, Ryan, you are so good at this that we give you an early contracted Essendon already.

Except Mick was not thinking that Mick didn't give a shit, whereas like, I'm playing footy as an 11 year old hoping that like Tony Lockett will say me and go like, yeah, you got something kid, I'm going to call the head of the AFL and get you a sponsorship, get you in the Club level.

Yeah, but yeah, they're saying congratulations, I'd love that to happen.

Thanks, commiserations.

And so then, so you knew then that you were pretty good?

Um, I guess I just sort of, yeah, from there it was just, that sort of just took out of my life, you know, got the bug of surfing, you sort of, I started doing more contests and sort of surfing against guys like Parker and Dean Morrison and, and you know, I wasn't beating them, but I was making the finals with them.

I was like, well, they're obviously going to be pro surfers.

So if I keep trying really hard, then hopefully my hard work would catch up to their talent.

This is going to sound like a really broad and obvious question, but I'm genuinely interested because I've never, I've like had a surf lesson once in my life.

But what is it that you love about surfing?

The ocean is forever changing.

Um, and it's, it's not so much a sport.

It's more like a lifestyle like I wake up and first thing I do is is look and see what the ocean's doing for the day.

And that's how I try and plan my day.

And is that like on an app or you literally go into the ocean?

Have a look. No, I'm looking out the window.

Yeah, because you probably live right on the water.

I'm on the lucky ones.

Got a house floating on a surfboard.

Yeah, we just, uh, floats in and out with the tide.

So I think for me it's a time for me that it's where I concentrate on me.

I concentrate on what I do in the ocean, but then also to the feeling of exercise, the endorphins you get from that, and then being in the ocean that, you know, sort of I sort of look at it as it just washes the emotions clean and starting again almost like baptism in the way.

Wow. Well, the, um, baptism is a really interesting idea about it.

Um, there, there's also, it feels like there must be something very humbling about surfing in that so many other sports and athlete would have a certain amount of control over everything.

I imagine take a lot of blame on the, on themselves for like, I didn't run that race the way I could have been there, the, or I could control as an athlete in that sport in say athletics, I and control so much of this.

Whereas you on every, as you said, it's changing all the time.

It must be a very humbling thing to have to work with an ever changing element to perfect your craft.

Does that make sense?

Yeah, yeah, definitely.

Um, you know, I think there's, there's nothing more humbling than mother nature.

Um, you can go from hero to zero just like that.

And that's the beauty of surfing also.

It also teaches you that you can only control the controllables.

You can't, you can't control the uncontrollables.

And the one thing is, you know, especially you know, you're competing or you can do as your best, you can't do any more than your best.

Um, and so I always had this thing.

All right, I'm going to try and do my best every time I go out and compete.

And if I win or win, if I lose, I lose.

That's okay. But if I know I've tried my best, then I can put my head on the pillow at night and be okay.

You know, you don't have that replay going over and over again.

And that served me well in, you know, outside of the water as well as you know, what's done is done.

Did I give it my best shot?

Did you try your best or did you half -arse it?

And I think that's probably the times where you're probably playing that over again is when you know you've half -assed it.

Yeah, so that's a big one for me.

If I'm going to do something, I've got to do it right.

Yeah, can you remember a time where you did half -assed it and you got to the end of the day and you're like, didn't do my best?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I actually had a really big wake up moment.

In 2004, I tore my hamstring off the bone and, you know, I had to get surgery and I was just sitting on the couch to press the home.

And I remember watching a replay of one of the events from the year before.

And when I was in the actual heat, I felt like I had got absolutely smashed.

and then I watched the heat and I was like I wasn't that far behind.

But what it was I remembered two nights before that heat I was at partying and I just had this immense guilt come over me and I was just like that was the perfect example of me half -assing it and taking things for granted and I vowed to myself.

I was I never wanted to feel that guilt ever again.

And so, yeah, then I went into this other psycho.

So, yeah, that was a big thing for me.

I knew a half -aster and I wanted to never feel that feeling again.

Wow. That's kind of a gift to having that moment of saying that and and going through that.

And also in what would've been a pretty shit circumstance of not being able to surf.

And, it sounds like your mental health wasn't great at that point sitting there thinking about what's next.

It's weird how a gift can come out of such a low time.

Yeah, for sure. Like, you know, there's always that saying, especially in sport, like there's always a reason for an injury and mine was because I was taking surfing for granted and not giving thing they all and, yeah, that was the time that it was like, you can go one of two ways.

Like I didn't know if I was going to surf again because no one had had that injury before, but then also too, it was like, well, if I do get back, then you better give it your all mate or otherwise you're just going to be like one of those other could have, should have, would have beans.

You know, so, yeah, it was a really big turning point.

I've had the identical injuries here, I've had exact same one, slightly less cooler circumstances than surfing.

I was dropping a catch at Backwood Square League and snapped the hamstring off the boat never near as cold.

I had to drive from sail to Melbourne by myself, that knot was horrific.

Um, so I know the exact pain.

It's really bad. Yeah.

It's not the funnest year.

I had to sail for 24 hours and then catch three flights home.

Yeah. You can't sit on your ass for a long time.

Sorry. I had to drive from sailboat to actually sail.

it gets actually so awkward.

Amazing. Is it time?

I just have one thing I wanted to ask about childhood because I just, it's like your childhood is just like roaring towards this.

The most exciting and joyful and successful crescendo almost.

Everything's just incredible.

and I come with the competition but you served in a competition I think is in 1997 or 1998 and you won or you were nominated as like the recognised as the best junior surfer in the country maybe in the world and then all of a sudden I don't know where tragedy strikes in the most awful so now you we don't have to talk about this as well by the way it's totally up to you I we're out so Josh and I said we're brothers our sister was really sick when we're growing up and to the point where there's a couple weeks where it was just kind of touch and go.

And ever since that moment I've had this horrific fear or nightmare of losing a sibling.

It's just like a new experience that as a 17, 18 year old.

And I can't even begin to imagine what that does to you in your life at that point.

It must have been just horrific.

Yeah. Um, yeah, it was sort of, I guess it almost brought the heart out of the community Um, for, for us, um, you know, the cool and gutta community was really, really tight -knit, um, and for me personally, yeah, obviously totally gutted.

Um, but I had to grow up and I had to grow up really fast overnight.

I was a, I was a boy and then had to grow into a man pretty much overnight where I was The first one that got told in the family.

There's a car accident Yeah, there's a car accident and yeah, Shawn who was three years old the man he passed in so I had to I got picked up by Detectives and two of the older like guys in in the community and like these two guys, you know, I I thought, you know, they were hard, hard men.

And I was thinking, I saw them with police.

I was like they're like, man, can I, nah, nah, I'm good.

I'm going to my mate's house.

I'm not getting involved with whatever you're doing.

And they're not getting the car.

And, you know, two of the hardest men in the community sitting there next to me and they had to tell me what had happened.

And, yeah, I had to go home.

I had to wake up my mom, tell her the news, get on the phone, ring my dad and luckily my other two brothers were with my dad at the time and they were all drinking together and I had to tell them and then I had to ring my sister who was in London at the time and so it felt like on my side, it was...

I was the rock for the family in a way, because I, I knew everything and, and everyone was trying to protect me.

And I was, and I was like, no, I just, I need to get down.

I need to see the place.

And they're like, no, you're not, you're not.

And, um, you wanted to go where they, I just needed to see it to believe it.

Um, and yeah, and then it was, it was weird.

it was, you know, people would be coming around to the house and, and it's, I actually really hate these words, but everyone in those situations, because you don't know what to say to someone, you know, everyone just says be strong.

And like I took it as, literally, like what, no emotion, no, anything.

thing. And and so I created this wall and and showed zero emotion.

And and yeah, where everyone is coming to me and crying on my shoulder.

I didn't feel like I went and had like I had my closest friends but I didn't want to burden them with my emotions because I knew how it made me feel and, and so I just put up this wall I wouldn't wouldn't talk to anyone about it, I wouldn't tell anyone the real story.

And yeah, held that on for a long time.

That was the last day that I was a boy and just had to man up from then on.

and internally, how was your mental health in the weeks after, but then also I guess the couple of years after that as well.

The weeks leading, I was really, really dark.

I didn't want to surf.

I didn't want to see people I would sit in my room.

At the time I had this really dark room, and I'll just sit in there, yeah, do nothing.

But I wouldn't, as I said, I wouldn't show people emotion during the day or when I'd see them or whatever, but when I'd get into my dark room, that's when it all came out.

It's one of those things.

People say that time heals and stuff like but you never lose that initial pain, you just learn how to navigate the emotions as you as you go through and and that's pretty much what I had to learn and deal with and so yeah it was not the easiest ride for a 17 year old kid but yeah I feel like I tried to, I felt like my brother was riding with me for the rest of my life and yeah.

You cause surfing is like, it seemed to be very spiritual experience.

I'm sure you feel a connection to him through the water and through surfing.

Yeah. It was like I was carrying him with me and every time, like I'm surfing or whatever, I'm talking to him.

Like some people talk to, I don't know, Zeus or wave gods, you or whatever.

But I would find myself talking to talking to Sean a lot.

Um, is that like, maybe silly question, but Jimi like, out loud, like literally talking, or is it just more like internal?

Just internal. Um, and then you know, you talk about spirituality.

Um, I would at times I would, I would feel his presence with me.

She just got massive goosebumps and, um, and I would feel, it was almost like, I'll get this burst of energy.

like crazy energy. Like doing things that I normally couldn't do, and I was very clear in what I was doing.

And so that was something that I knew he was with me.

And so it sort of gave me that extra little bit of confidence, and then when my eldest brother Peter passed away, I knew when he was with me because it was a totally different feeling.

It was really, he, he was mischievous and full of energy and just, you know, full character.

But when he's around, crazy calm, very calm.

And so yeah. So that's Peter, when Peter was around you felt calm?

Yeah, it felt really calm when Pete was around.

So it was, I can sort of differentiate who's, who's with me at the time.

And now with Edward just passing, I'm still trying to figure out what he feels.

like. Um, but I know he's around.

I think he's, I think he's more looking after my kids.

Wow. Yeah. I don't know.

They, they, Like the older brother.

Yeah, it seems like, seems like when, um, you know, when he gets brought up or whatever, the kids change a little bit.

They go, they go almost not internally quiet, but they sort of just center.

And, um, yeah. So I don't know.

I, I i'm, as I said, I'm still working through that.

Um, it's only still really fresh and raw in that sense.

So yeah, just trying to learn how to navigate that one.

To have loved and lost three siblings.

I can't, I don't, I don't know what to say to that, but the strength you must have.

I mean, I know people in your position where I don't have a choice.

But just to acknowledge.

Thanks. Your mum's an interview, she said, as really, I loved it so much, she said, Mick is a beautiful, beautiful man.

And she paused and she said again, she said, he's a beautiful man.

And I feel like these experiences kind of add to the beauty, in a way of you and your story.

Maybe she was talking internally.

Yeah, um, yeah, it's, it's, um, yeah, you don't wish it upon anyone.

Um, but you have two ways to go.

You can either sit in that sadness and that depression and make that your identity or Or the way I went about it was I want to celebrate them.

And you know, when people bring them up and talk about them, I want to talk about the good times.

I want to talk about the, the laughter and you know, beating each other up as kids.

And, you know, those things are hilarious to me.

Um, and you know, we have, so we have, we had a really fun life together and, And so they're the moments that I want to cherish, like I don't really want to know about the death or whatever because that didn't define who they were.

It was who they were as people that I try and celebrate.

I don't know, without wanting to glorify violence, but have you got a funny beating up story about your brothers?

Oh yeah, probably the most memorable one that were all together.

about. Um, me and Sean came home from school and, um, you know, we're, um, yeah, it was disgusting.

Um, but we started having this spit fight.

Spitting on each other.

Like started office just like that.

And then it turned into full gollies.

She wasn't home. Mum was off working, so he could just pay the rent.

And got to a point where Sean got me so good with a golly straight in the eye.

And I lost it, and I just punched him.

And then he's like, I'm not taking that.

And he just started laying into me.

As he's laying into me, Ed walks through the door.

And Ed's like, you can't hit him, he's too small.

And so Ed came in and cracked Sean, and they were going at it and you know, Sean's calling the police and, oh, he was, he was a bit of a dramatic.

Well the cops, I think then did have a spit division.

So he's, you know, he's got beat up by, by Ed.

And then for the one time that Pete lived with us as well, he just walked out from his room and he's just sees Ed laying into Sean.

He's like, can't do that!

He's too small !" And so he just grabbed Ed and just punched Ed straight in the mouth and Ed had pretty bad teeth and he had this one fang and it just went straight through his lip and yeah.

And then 10 minutes later, mum walks through the door and Ed's just bleeding, needs stitches.

By that time me and Peter were just laughing at them too.

So, uh, but then how long does it take, like, is it like hours, days or weeks until you're all laughing at that?

Oh, it was the next morning at breakfast.

Yeah, yeah, it wasn't laughing because he couldn't eat breakfast.

That's like, in the moment, it's like all hell's broken loose.

But you know, we all laugh about it at the end.

A very, very dear friend of Josh and mine, a guy called Scotty Gordon who's an incredible surfer, a wonderful guy.

He said to us to ask you about, he's right into his surfing and to be quite frank, he'd write in to you.

He said to ask you about a dolphin that was with you on a surf.

A world title. Oh, okay.

And we don't know what that is, but we...

You ready to get weird?

No, it was my first world title.

We're in Brazil. and it was 2007.

I had the opportunity to clinch the world title at that event and it was weird.

Every time I would go and surf a heap there'd be a dolphin in the in the channel and it was around the time when all the stuff came out of Japan about the dolphin killings and all that sort of stuff.

And, you know, the internet was new, and that's how you sort of started making everything go viral.

And I got it sent to me.

So I just send it to my whole inbox.

And I at the time I was like, I just must be a dolphin come to say, thanks for sending an email.

Because that would make sense.

Yeah, a hundred percent.

You're welcome. And then, um, you know, the day went on.

History has a, a one.

But when I went in, one of the filmas, um, came up to me and he's, he's like, did you see the dolphin?

I was like, yeah, I saw it every heat.

He goes, you know that dolphin would only show up in your heat and would disappear as soon as you went in.

And he's like, do you think it's your brother?

And I was like, I don't know, but a media person was right there.

That just went. But, yeah, look, it could have been.

It could have been brother.

It could have been a dolphin.

Just saying thanks for the email.

Quite equally possible.

That's so interesting because as you're experiencing the loss you've experienced and the grief, obviously, the amount of thinking, it's such a unique, tragically unique experience.

Do you think your, your spirituality has changed as a result?

Like, do you think, like, would you have thought that the dolphin could possibly be representing someone before?

Um, look, my, my mom's pretty spiritual in the, in that side of it.

Um, and like her favourite thing in the world was walking along the, the, the break walls that in Balanar and seeing the dolphins and stuff like that but yeah she was always you know we weren't really big on religion it was more spirituality like and for me I sort of feel like don't wanna get too weird on you all but I feel like the the energy just stays in the universe and you know they might come back as reincarnated they might might not they might just be cruising around and just checking in on different people.

And so yeah, it was definitely, you know, wasn't one of those moments where I was like, am I being crazy here or something like that?

But yeah, it's just sort of take it as it is.

And it could have been a person might not have been, well, it could have just been a dolphin checking out surfing, so.

Yeah, it's such, it's such a nice thought though, to think of, think of it like that, that someone's energy stays in the universe.

Yeah, well I just, yeah, you know, you sort of talk about souls and stuff like that.

It's all just energy, like, and so energy makes the world go around in the universe.

So I figured that's just my theory on it all, yeah.

There's a beautiful quote by Nick Cave that I'm probably going to butcher here, but he He talks about, cause he's suffered an unimaginable loss of losing a son or two sons now, and I've heard him recently interviewed and he talked about grief and trauma and going through that experience.

And some of what you said before to me echoed his sentiment and he talked about how you can choose to harden around that grief and go inwards.

And you were talking about that choice of it's, it's easy to go down that path of being very depressed.

And he's like, that is a coping mechanism.

And he's like, it's a totally valid one, but it's, he described it as a really dangerous one.

It can be incredibly isolating.

Uh, and then he, he speaks about how for him, it allowed him to look outwards and see the collective trauma and grief that's experienced by humans everywhere and it can be a really connecting experience to the rest of the world.

And hearing you speak, it seems like that's, that might ring true.

Yeah, for sure. Like, um, you know, people might look at me and say, yeah, you've been through some hell and yeah, I have, but there are other people out in the world that have lost as much or more than me.

Like I look at my parents, I'm like, if I lost one of my kids, like that's the scariest thing in the world.

And they've lost three kids.

And I see them with each loss.

I see a little bit more of them die and it's, it's, yeah, it's hard.

And there's walls in the world and people don't think it's it.

You get stuck in your own world in a sense.

But man, And there's so much more tragedy out there and it's, yeah.

Like life is a rollercoaster, you got to take the good with the bad.

And I guess, you know, one enlightening moment for me, was I was in Africa.

I was in Rwanda and you know, I was sorta, I was being a sulk actually.

I was like, ah, just sick of driving sick of flying.

You know, and just, just was like crying poor me.

And then I see this group of kids playing with a Coke bottle, a plastic Coke bottle, you know, weren't in the best clothes, they're dirty and they were having so much fun.

So much fun, and I was like they have the tiniest bit of what I have and here I am crying poor me I can grow up you know and be grateful for what you have and yeah just try and give it more you know it doesn't mean that I don't have days where I still go poor me but when I look in the mirror it's like there's people out there with a lot worse off situations than I do and And so I've got to be very grateful for all the great things that I have, you know, and not dwell on the bad.

Beautifully said. I've heard some stories about what you did during the floods in 2022, up north.

2022 floods, yeah. Would you mind describing what you guys are doing up there?

And then I'll ask some questions off the back of it maybe, but it'd be interesting to hear.

Yeah. So it's, it sort of started, obviously, the rains came down and there was like, you know, It's like Armageddon -style stuff.

And how it started was Parker and a couple of mates just went down the river on jet skis, just to check it out, just to have a look.

And then the next thing they know, they're pulling people out of houses.

They're saving people from these floods.

And I was at home making sure my family was safe and all that kind of stuff, and then a text came through that night from parking and he goes, hey guys, we need to get back down there tomorrow.

He said he pulled like anywhere between 15, 20 people out of houses just on his jet ski.

And he said there's so many more people down there that need help.

And so the next day, group of us guys that have jet skis in the surfing community, we said, all right, first light, let's just jump on the skis and we'll just head up the river and just see what we can find.

And, and it was, it was next level.

It, we didn't realise like what started as what we thought might've been, you know, go up for a few hours and come home, was...

the next thing went on for weeks and...

You were going there every day for a week.

Yeah, so we would be, you know, going into these towns and you wouldn't even recognise them.

Like, I was on streets that I knew pretty well.

I didn't know where I was.

And it started We started off the first day we were just going in and we're sort of relaying back to crew back home and texting our partners and stuff like that.

You know, these people don't have water, they don't have fuel, they don't have, or anything for, anything really, food.

And so our partners back on land were like, all right, we've got to start setting up how, like a station where people can bring food, can bring water.

And it just started snowballing like next level.

The what the girls did over the next week was like military came in and they're like, this is the best operation we've ever seen.

You know, I want them on on the opposite side of espionage.

And, and, yeah, We were just out there and we were just on phones when we could get reception, just like getting a pin or an address, like take water here, people were taking, you know, we had one doctor that was stuck up in Malworlem bar.

We had to go, one of the crew had to go get him, zip him back down to tweed, get blood for a patient, otherwise the patient was dead, zip him back up to Malworlem bar on the ski, which was probably about, it's a, normally it's a 30, 35 minute drive.

So on a jet ski up a river, just floor on it.

A funny one was, I don't know if you know the mad whos, but Dean and Sean, they're, they're in their boats and Sean had a, a, a woman that was just about to give birth.

She was in labour and he's flying down the river and he sees his brother and his brother's waving to him.

He's like no she's gonna give birth you know just come check this out and he goes over and he's like I got a horse in the boat.

Yeah it was it was like it was wild a few minutes.

This was all in one day.

And then and we ended up like it, it went like so day one, we were just trying to figure out, you know, wherever it was, making sure people was safe, getting them to dry land if they wanted to get out of there.

And then the next day was like, we were up the Riverton Wollomba and we had barges and boats bringing food and water, fuel, I had a, the girl who owns the pharmacy, I got her up the river So, she could get the pharmacy open to get medication to people that needed medication.

And I ended up creating this hub in Mulwoolumba, and I'm directing police officers.

Like, this food needs to go here, this water needs to go there.

The hospital had no food, no water or anything like that.

So, we're, you know, supplying them.

And these are just regular civilians, and we're directing people who should be in the love what's going on.

And, and it just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger.

And like next thing we're doing helicopter runs, like I'm ringing up pilots and, and trying to organize pilots, like I'm hiring off my own money, just hiring helicopters to go and drop food to people that haven't had anything in five days.

And, and it was just like, as I said, the girls that were they were getting all the, um, all the comms and they were like just sending out addresses and To the helicopters To helicopters, to the boats, the cars.

And then, and it was, it was wild.

It was, it was so crazy.

Then we got, we finally, the sort of the rain stopped and we had water dissipate enough where the people in our, sort of, like, tweedshire were safe enough.

But then we started hearing of, down the coast, like past Ballinor and Lismore, Korakai and Evans Head and, you know, Broadwater, that area, they were only getting all the water that was up at Lismore and they're getting hammered and they're like, No one's coming to save them and so the team that we assembled They just jumped on the highway and would drive as far as they possibly could never been they've never been to these towns before and As soon as the water came up to where they couldn't drive anymore just throw their jet skis and boats in and just started doing the same thing down there and Yeah,

it's it was a crazy crazy operation and Yeah, it was a really emotional one.

I guess a lot of the women sort of, they didn't get the satisfaction of going and seeing the elation of people you're getting picked up or you're giving them food or water or something.

Yeah, some of them didn't even know where the kids were for five days because they were so locked in to making sure that these people was, were safe or had something.

And because it was life and death situations.

It was, it was, yeah, it was so wild.

I mean, I know, I know it's like probably a super high emotion.

And this is, I know this is, I don't mean to be like, I know this is not the right question to ask necessarily.

But if I was like, in my house and then saving and you rocked up, I'd be like, Oh my God.

Just Mick Fermi. Did you have any strange?

We had a couple of moments like that and then, it's just like, actually, because they would recognise the Red Bull Ski and so they would see the Red Bull Ski coming up and they were like, alright, where...

We've got Mick. Yes, someone in...

we sort of um they called us the the carumban community pretty much and and that was the the crew that sort of just kept going out and so we were sort of like the first port of call that had food water and all and that and so yeah the whole it was wild like the whole community really got behind it all and and really backed each other and um yeah it was the community spirit was so overwhelming.

It was a really beautiful thing for such a tragedy.

That is incredible.

But to layer it onto what I was saying before, to me there could be a choice there of the hardening thing when the world has taken so much from you and your family, to then see something like this and go another confirmation that the world's just fucked, Um, or to choose to, to look outward and to, to reach out and do things for other people.

It's sort of a two -part question, but why, why is it important to reach out and strengthen those community bonds?

And also, where does that come from?

And where does that strengthen come from to go, nah, I'm gonna, we're jumping in with doing something here.

probably the simplest answer is when I've ever gone through something terrible or something good, I've had a community behind me and I've had really good people to, you know, lift me up and so I pay homage to those people by if something happens and I have the opportunity to help someone else.

I've got to do it because I'm paying respects to those that have helped me.

So that's, that's where it comes from plus my mom's a nurse, I've got to help people.

Um, but yeah, that's, that's the biggest, that's probably the simplest answer is yeah, paying respect to those who have helped me.

It's a beautiful answer and a beautiful kind of life philosophy about having or a way to live, having community around you, and your best and worse moments.

Yeah, and as you said, that's life.

It's not all sunshines and rainbows, and you know who your real friends are in those situations, and yeah, I'm lucky enough that my friends have never wavered.

And if, yeah, if they need anything from me, then they know who to call, so, you know?

Incredible, beautiful.

Right. I remember getting to chat about the shark attack.

I genuinely, I was like, I know mix going through so much.

But I genuinely thought, well the shark story is the one like that's the story, but I'm my mind has been changed now.

But, but let's, let's say it's kind of like it is kind of an easy one, but also it did lead you through some pretty dark times off the back of that incident.

A little bit, yeah.

Look, to be honest, that was the easiest thing I've been through.

Your near -death experience.

Yeah, look, it was terrifying.

Yeah, I won't deny that.

Just because I mean, I imagine most people know the story, but there will be people who aren't aware of what happened.

Do you mind just explaining just as simply as you can?

Yeah. I was in a final of an event in Jeffries Bay, South Africa.

And the final just started.

Julian Wilson, who I was competing against in the final, just caught a wave and I was just sitting there and I thought it was like all right, I might just move down the point a little bit.

And so I went to go and just sit up on my board and start paddling.

And and I just heard a splash behind me.

And I was like, oh no.

And next thing I know, I'm entangled with a shark and it's bumped me, I'm trying to put my, as it's gone through it got stuck in my leg rope and so it's thrashing and I'm trying to put my board between me and the shark and then all of a sudden and I just get this whack from the tail straight to the head and get thrown back and then the next thing was, I guess if you watch the footage, the wave comes up at that point and no one knew what was happening, but - So nine seconds, nine seconds where you didn't know.

Yeah, the late nine hours.

And the shark had actually circled back and it had bumped me And then the last thing I saw was my board on its fin, just drifting off.

I like stuck on it.

Yeah. And I was just drifting off and I was just like, oh it's on.

And so I just started screaming and swimming and then I was sort of like swimming in.

I was like, hang on.

If this thing's going to come and eat me, If I just keep swimming away, it's, you know.

Probably going to catch you.

Yeah, it'll catch me and just eat me without a fight.

It'd be easy. And so I thought, in my, in my brain, I was like, well, let's fight it if we're going to go down.

Let's go. Did you try and keep getting your spat on it?

Yeah, I remember, yeah, I was like, no, I know how to get someone big, I know.

And yeah, so I was just trying to get myself as high as I possibly could.

So I could see, see it coming, and...

genuinely thought let's fight it.

Yeah. Well, if you're gonna fight or flight mode, so.

Wow. So you kind of like kick yourself up as high as you can.

Yeah. Just try, you know, in water polo And they can get it.

Yeah. So I, you trying to do that and yeah.

Luckily it didn't come back and you know, Julian was so courageous and you know, I don't know what he was thinking.

I was telling him to go in, but he kept coming towards me and, That's amazing that.

Yeah. Yeah, like the courage, like I always think about what would I do in that situation?

Would I go or would I not?

Sounds like you'd go.

I have no idea what you said today.

You never know. That's having an off day.

Um, but yeah, like that, that courage at e -show was like next level.

Because I don't know what you actually, when it's more like just emotional support really, Like when you get out there, it's I guess you're giving the shark another option.

That's all you're really doing.

Yeah. Almost, you know, or you just sort of confusing it or whatever.

Yeah. But, you know, sharks are powerful predators and, and they know what they're doing.

Even before you see them.

So, Why, why do you think it didn't come back?

I don't think like from all the, from all the research that I've done from all the different Um, researchers that I've spoken to, I think it was just inquisitive.

It was like, Oh, here's what's this.

I haven't seen this before.

And it went to come and have a look at me and then realized like last minute, oh, this isn't what I wanted to eat.

So it tried to pull out, but that's when it got caught in my leg, right?

Um, and so yeah, um, so for anything, I mean, it's kind of because I'm going to, I'm terrified of sharks and it's a big part of why like surfing terrifies me the thought of going out there and knowing they could be there.

But that in a weird way that that kind of is comforting knowing that it's actually not wanting to eat you, it's just checking you out.

Yeah, you know, there's been other footage of them coming up and checking people out and then last minute just taking off, you know, and the people in the water don't know like it's the drones that have caught it.

Yeah. And so it happens a lot.

But didn't? I mean the story I've heard is that you punched it.

I don't tell that part.

It was just to be honest, I was just like when I was trying to get my board in there, I was just like.

Swinging. Swinging.

And then you could take a moment back, you know, media again.

It's like, yeah, I punched it.

I was just so high on adrenaline, got to the beach and I'm just balling my eyes out.

That's what interests me a lot, because I watched it last night just before I went to sleep.

Which incidentally led to me dreaming about you for about six hours, but now I'm.

Of course I'm wearing.

Rip curl hoodie? Full rip curl.

Right on brand. No, that's...

But that's the thing that struck me, was the the someone grabbed you as you're walking out of the waterfront interview.

And they said how did you, how did you fight it off?

And you just gave that answer.

And then it became this, the guys, it was sort of funny.

And so I thought you were forced into playing this like yeah, I'm an Aussie who fight sharks.

Which wasn't really the narrative that was I mean, you knew you were nearly killed, you could have died.

And then that was kind of the, the vibe of it was you're this like crazy Aussie fight sharks.

But really, it didn't for a while after you kind of struggle a bit is that right, mental health I did yeah I guess um you know once I had time to reflect like even like an hour after um like I was so high like my adrenaline was through the roof and you know I got to get back to the contest site and I saw the footage and I saw and I was like whoa like I didn't think like it was that big of a shark when I was in the moment and then when I saw the size of it I was like holy shit and that's when it all sort of sunk in and I was like oh no and then I was doing okay and it's you know motion hit me and stuff like

that but then it wasn't until I ran into a friend of mine who's a wife of one of the surfers on tour I saw her and she's a you know she's a mother and I just broke down everything just collapsed I almost fell down and And that was like a big moment that I realized that, shit.

Like that could have been it.

And so, and then like the next day, you know, we sort of had a party and it was almost like a, going to your own wake, like one minute, everyone's laughing, next minute everyone's crying.

It was actually really fun party.

So the weight of it kind of dawned on everyone.

Yeah, but yeah, and then, you know, I sort of woke up the next day and, you know, I was sort of moving around and I went, just wanted to go and just check the space.

And, and then there's camera crews everywhere.

And I was just like, I didn't really think much of it or whatever.

And so I did one interview and then I realized I just saw all these camera crews coming in as like, Oh, I got to go.

I got to catch a plane.

and I sat on the plane and a woman's reading the paper next to me and she's like, how crazy is that?

The kid almost got eaten by a shark in a surfing contest and I looked over and there I was on the front page of the paper and I was just like yeah it's pretty heavy.

I looked out the window and just started crying and I was like, oh yeah.

Yeah, so it was sort of a hard one to sort of like, yeah, like process and um, how soon after it did you talk to your mum?

Oh I spoke to him, spoke to my parents straight away.

Mum was, mum was watching live streams.

Oh my gosh. Cause she had nine seconds where I think she said I thought he was gone.

She said when the wave came up, I thought I'd never see him again.

And, so, yeah, I spoke to her straight away.

And then I rang my dad, I woke my dad up in the middle, who was in the middle of the night and he goes, hey, how are you?

And I'm good, just letting you know, almost got eaten by a shark.

And he's like, you okay?

I'm like, yeah. And he's like, okay, no no.

Man, a few words. And then he woke up to the news in the morning, he's like, brings me back and goes, You didn't tell me it was that gnarly.

I was like, I know, it was pretty wild.

But yeah, it was sort of the weeks afterwards was the hardest.

It would come back to me in dreams, and it was always anywhere from like 2 a .m.

to 6 a .m., and I'd wake up just kicking the sheets off or, or whatever, and at that time, I hadn't really had anyone to talk to.

And I was trying to figure out like who do I talk to.

And spoke to my sports site guy.

I spoke to different doctors.

And it wasn't until I spoke to a friend who was in the military and he had a similar thing with like a landmine, you know, and blew the car up and, and so, um, yeah, he sort of he's like, look.

The way you look at it is if you see those signs, it's going to bring up emotion and stuff like that.

But just know it's almost like when you almost get hit by a car crossing the road.

You've still got to get on with life and still keep moving.

And, and so that's how I've sort of looked at it as like it was an incident.

Um, it doesn't mean anything.

It's just a... Yeah it was just something that happened and I was very fortunate and very lucky to get away with but it shouldn't stop you from going surfing and to be honest the first surf back I was doing a piece for 60 minutes they wanted to capture that first surf back and they took me to a spot that was bits occluded and I had my mate on Jet Ski and I'm paddling out And I'd been raining and we're right near a river and, and, um, I sort of was paddling out and I just see these fin.

Yeah. And I'm just like, Hey, is he like, is that, is that a fin?

I'm like, let me just jump on the ski for a second.

And then he sat out.

He's like, nah, you're tripping.

You're just making up now.

And I'm like, no, just wait, just wait.

Sure enough. So a little little shark fin.

and come through and we were laughing like it was like, I wasn't scared.

Yeah, different sense of humor to me.

Yeah, we came in and I'm like, Hey guys, I'm not making this up.

But there's a shark out there.

So we might want to wrap this up and go and surf somewhere else.

I've just called Quid's for 10 years.

And then we found the most beautiful beach, no one around you know, crystal blue water and felt totally fine.

Let me speak to your mum about how she felt watching that footage, knowing that, you know, she'd already lost a son or in front of her very eyes watching her son do their thing that he loves more than anything.

Have you asked her about that?

Yeah. I didn't have to ask her, she just tells me.

But yeah, she, she expressed everything and, you know, I know, I, I guess it was a interview Like I live with mum through those tragedies and so yeah.

We didn't have to really talk about it.

It was just more, yeah, acknowledging it.

Yeah. And she trusts me in what I do and the decisions I make.

And so she was like, look, if you go back out, like, you don't have to, but if you do go back out, then I trust you in what you do.

And, yeah, so it was just, it was just acknowledging her.

and acknowledging the family and, but letting them know that I'm not going to do anything stupid on purpose, but yeah, just sort of, just trust me in where I'm at.

This might be an impossible question to answer, but there's been a couple of moments throughout this incredible conversation where you've said through some of the darker times and it and you've had many that there's there's a choice to be made.

What are the things that you do to help you make that choice?

Or what have, what has helped you even if you didn't realize you were doing it to make the choice to, to keep going, sort of thing?

Um, yeah, I guess, I guess it's almost sitting with it all and looking into the future in some way.

Um, you know, if I take the, if I take the bad path or the dark path, where's that going to lead me to?

Is that going to lead me to alienating myself?

Is that leading me to, um, alcohol or drug depression?

Is that going to lead me to, um, yeah, doing something worse?

Or look at the good path and say find strength, better yourself try and learn from mistakes and and just keep as we always said at the start just do your best.

And yeah looking at those two pictures this one didn't look great to me.

And so I was like, I'm just gonna keep my best and it's not gonna be like, you know, you walk through a door and it's green fields and, and stuff like that.

It's more, it's going to take work.

And, and with anything you've got to work hard at getting through these situations and, you know, there, there's definitely been times where I couldn't get out of bed.

There's definitely been times where I was so deep and dark and depression where, you know, close up the room.

didn't want to see anyone.

Um and but over the years, I've sort of been able to almost put a label on it um like at the end of two thousand fifteen, like had the shark attack had um had a marriage breakdown and then my brother Peter passed away at the end of the year and and a picture that came to me was Like, imagine like a giant barrel, like a keg, wooden keg sort of thing.

And, you know, if it's filled with water, you're having a lot of fun.

I looked in mine at the end of that year and it was just bone dry.

Like the, there was no light in it.

There was no life. It was just empty.

And I made a decision that I'm going to do things for me, do things that make me happy and do things.

that I wanted to fill that barrel back up.

And it took me like, it took me a good couple of years, but, um, yeah.

The barrels pretty bloody full beautifully said there's also it's a beautiful sentiment that, and such a realistic one that, um, it's, it's hard and it's, um, it's not going to happen straight away, but it's almost like reorientating yourself in a direction to get there.

Yeah, for sure. For sure.

And the other thing too is like, if you think of the barrel, you can't just pick up another whole barrel and fill it up in one go.

It's either going to take a cup of so many cups of water or a bucket of water and you're going to have to keep going back to the source to fill it back up.

So it's not going to change overnight.

But you can take steps to fill that thing over time.

That is one of the best analogies I've heard when it comes to that.

And you love analogies.

I love analogies. I really like that one.

Create out my own way.

That's a rip up. That's a mate.

It's so true. Did you ever get like, if you don't mind me asking professional help to do it, like, did you ever have therapy along the way?

Does that... Yeah, I, you know, in, in 2009 I met a sports psychologist by name Michael J 'Vay and he's like well renowned in the States and he, it was funny.

Like the first time we ever, we ever met, I've walked into the Red Bull offices and, And within half an hour, I'm in his office, bawling my eyes out.

Like, you know, I've never told anyone the story about how Sean passed away.

I'm bawling my eyes out.

He's one of the first persons I ever told.

And I just felt with him.

I was just so comfortable that I could tell him anything.

And, um, I don't, I don't use him in the therapy sense anymore.

We're just mates. Um, but yeah, he, he helped me a lot.

Not only with my craft of surfing, but also my mental health and um, yeah, look, it's, if you find that right person like people say go to a psychologist or go and do this, but you have to find someone that you connect with.

What was it about him?

Don't know I feel like there's, there's some people that you just meet them and you feel like you can trust them.

And you feel like you can, you know, have a chat to them.

Like, like even just sitting in this room with you guys we just met, but I feel comfortable enough to tell you real stories where if it was stoic and hard and whatever, I would've given you half of the shit that, you know.

There's two different versions that I tell.

And - You're saying we're lifelong friends now.

Yeah, yeah that's cool.

Cool. I'm taking you surfing.

Oh. You just, there's different people that you just can feel like you can trust from that initial onset and um, it's probably trial and error as well.

Yeah, it was for me.

I was saying a few socks and at the first one was not good.

Second one, I was just like I had to where this is going.

And the third one from the get -go, I was like, this is amazing.

And I feel like this is the person that I can share everything with and I can put it all out on the table.

And yeah, it was life -changing.

Yeah. It's almost like going to a chiropractor.

You know, some will just see for 15 minutes and get you out the door and be like, well, how can I, give me some tools so I don't have to come see you again?

And like if, I feel like if your psychologist isn't doing that, if you can't work on yourself, And you're only in there for if it's half an hour, an hour, whatever, and that's the only place that you do it, then it's going to take you forever.

You need to find someone that gives you those tools and help you work on that at home.

It sounds like Red Bull is a good place to facilitate people's psychologists.

I just call Red Bull and they'll find someone for you.

Give them a call, I won't give you the number.

Great. I've just, this has been one of the most amazing chats genuinely Mick.

It's like I feel so, so lucky.

I mean, to meet you, yes, but like to for you to tell all those stories, it's, I feel really lucky.

So thanks so much. This has been just such a pleasure.

Thank you for joining us today and I, yeah, conversation I think we'll never forget.

So thank you so much for having me.

very, very proud. Thanks for having me and Coach Velazquez.

And thanks for having me.

And, uh, mates for life now.

Let's get our calendars out actually, and lock in that surf.

That's right. Yeah.

Let's do that before we forget.

Thank you, mate. Awesome.

Thank you. Cheers. Keep on.

Keep on. Keep on. Keep on.

You heard that. Mates for life.

He said it. Unprompted.

Yeah. Mates for life.

Yeah, there's no script held up or anything.

Yeah, he must be so busy because he's not answering any of the messages I'm telling, but he'd be so flat out, so I'll give it another two years.

If he's still not messaging back then I'll assume it's lying.

Thanks. A big, very big thank you to Mark Northeast.

Oh, true. Who made Bridget our producer's dad, who just very casually said over dinner, Oh, I've got someone you might want to have on your show thing and he said Mick Fanning and we didn't believe it happened, but it did.

It did. What a legend of a person and Australian icon.

Mark? Yeah. Mark actually, I would double down on that.

Mark North East, absolute Australian icon.

Why, who do you think I was talking about?

Well that's what I thought you were talking about.

Yeah, Mark North East, yeah.

Anyway, I wanted to talk about something that really stood out for me in that episode was, well really just the topic of grief because I couldn't believe I was sitting across the table from a man who had six months prior, lost his only living brother.

I know. There are times when we're doing this podcast and we're interviewing the person and they're telling their story and they're like so generously sharing like whatever trauma they've been through, what they've experienced.

And I find myself sitting there listening, I can't believe this happened to you.

Like, I remember it was, you know, particularly during like Brooke Blurtons the chat with Brooke Blurton and there's been a number of times it's happened, but that was another one where I'm like, I cannot believe you're telling us this story.

Yeah. It's wild. Yeah.

I really felt that strongly with Mick.

I was kind of looking at him going, if somebody was like what is happening in your heart right now, like where are you at with all your experience in your life and I was just in awe of the way he was able to talk about the different energies that he thinks his brothers have now, they bring to when he talks about his older brother being his kids have this energy around them or when he's out on the surf, he feels a different energy of his brothers.

And it got me thinking about the stages of grief And we did touch on this with Michael Klim's episode because of his condition that he had that meant that he can't—well, he's a different person physically and so he was grieving, you know, the life that he couldn't really live.

And I've been thinking a lot about grief recently because I had a session with my psychologist in July last year and she said to me and I will go into the details of why on a different episode when I eventually feel ready, but my psychologist said to me, here you are right right in the depths of the depression stage of grief.

And again, I will talk about that on another episode, but not here.

And so I've been paying a lot of attention to the different stages of grief and how they work and what they look like.

And I just to be clear what I my grief is very different to me, and I don't think anyone who is intense, but I just wanna talk about the stages of grief and what they potentially look like.

Because I feel like from out there who's in a grieving process.

made that even realise, like I didn't realise last year, I was, it's really helpful to know that you step your way through different stages, and that what you're going through is actually quite normal, it's actually part of a process, and it's a healthy place to be.

It felt like a strange thing to be told, the depression I was experiencing was a healthy step to go through.

So I just want to touch on the different stages.

People might remember this from Mark Clim's episode, it was the Kubler -Ross model, stages of grief.

So in 1969, Elizabeth Kübler -Ross wrote, she was a Swiss American psychiatrist.

She wrote in her book on death and dying that grief could be divided into five stages.

Her observations came from years and years of working with terminally ill individuals.

So stage one is denial, that denial gives you time to absorb what has actually happened.

So for example, if it was a death of a loved one like Mick, you actually sort of say to yourself, no, they're not gone.

They're actually not gone.

There's no way this has happened.

I'm gonna say that tomorrow there's no way.

And that can go on a while as you give yourself kind of like your brain time to catch up to what's actually happened.

In the case of maybe a breakup or a divorce, that's like saying, no, we'll be back together tomorrow.

They're just upset.

They've just got about upset about something, but we'll be back together tomorrow.

We'll be totally fine.

She says that denial is a defense mechanism typically used to numb the intensity of the situation that you find yourself in, What you think about is such a helpful experience, I guess, as you're trying to cushion the blow from what's just happened.

It's like refusing to accept what's happening.

Yeah. It feels like that.

It's like, even though you know it's real, but there's some way you're not...

I mean, it's different with a breakup where there is like, I guess some chance that you could get back together.

But yeah, that refusal to accept, I find, I do that a lot.

it. Um, as you move out of the denial stage, uh, the emotions you've been hiding will begin to rise, and you're confronted with a lot more sorrow than you may have originally experienced because you kind of pushed it down.

Um, it's a really important part of the cycle, but a really painful one for people.

Um, and the second stage is anger.

So, where denial may be considered a coping mechanism, anger is a masking effect.

Um, anger is actually hiding the real emotion of the pain that you actually carry.

So, for example, again, the death of loved one.

Um, it might be like something, say this is not a mixed example, but saying, well, if they cared for themselves more, this wouldn't have happened.

Like you're actually angry at that person for awhile.

Again, it's, it's not a defence mechanism.

It's more of a masking or a break of a divorce would be an obvious one.

Like, well, I hate them anyway.

So they're going to regret leaving.

And I don't care. Um, even though you do deeply, it's just like you just, it's a, you're like, you're masking the way you truly feel.

So why would you want using anger?

Why would you be using anger to mask something?

Why would you not want to say how you really feel?

Well, it reminds me of often when, for those who've got kids, when your child is really angry about something, they're actually just hiding what they're actually hurt or they're feeling ashamed or we do as adults as well.

But it's like a shame is, is a really uncomfortable, ugly emotion to sit with and to admit to it's much easier to get angry.

Yeah. And we, I think we feel a bit more in control when we're angry.

And we do. And I guess maybe it's pointing the finger away from you.

Yeah. Yeah, or pointing the finger away from your actual emotions, definitely.

So, the third stage is bargaining.

Where you find yourself creating a lot of what if scenarios, which I think is, it makes sense, but it's like, it's a line of defense against the emotion of grief.

Which kind of, that sort of, postpones the sadness a bit.

So, I'm sure something Mike would have gone through, was like, what if I'd stayed and gone home together.

Or what if what if I'd got him to walk home with me or what if what if we chose not to go to that party or just you'd play those things over and over and a break up of divorce.

It could be if only I'd spent more time with them.

If only I'd done this.

If only I'd made sure I listened more.

If only I'd kind of wishing it could go back in time to change the script.

And then after that stage four is depression.

So whereas anger and bargaining Something can feel very active, depression may feel like a more of a quiet stage of growth where you don't potentially feel like going out and being around people, there may not be as much conversation or dialogue happening in your head around what ifs and getting angry.

It's just you're really sitting in the sadness, you're really in the sadness of what's taken place and it's almost like a paralyzing or crippling type feeling where you just cannot about, tough times get out of bed or almost feels like hopeless.

Yeah. So maybe the reason why you'd be, getting angry and masking or what was the first one, the denial, it's because that feeling of depression is so, it's so painful and scary and lonely.

And, and I guess hopeless that that's probably what you, what you mean.

I'm just sort of catching up now.

But that's sort of what, those feelings of, those true, how you truly feel maybe comes out a little bit more in that depression where it feels like there's nothing you can do about it.

And so you're using the anger and the, and the denial to avoid having those feelings.

In my experience, it was when I was truly honest with myself with what I truly left, what had happened in our lives.

Just, I couldn't avoid it anymore.

I couldn't bargain in a way.

I couldn't, um, I couldn't pretend it wasn't happening.

And you know, I couldn't stop doing what if scenarios was just, it's, it's, it's here.

This has happened. And it's a very, very, the physical sensation to me was just like exhausting and, and just heavy feeling is always with you.

And you can have moments where you forget about it, but it's fleeting.

It's with you pretty much all the time, but the stage here, the next stage, stage five is, and I don't know, I could be wrong.

When I looked at Mick, this is kind of what I felt like I was dealing with was acceptance.

Acceptance is not necessarily a happier uplifting stage of grief.

It doesn't mean you've moved past the grief or loss.

It does mean that you've accepted and have come to terms with and understand what this means for your life now.

And so for Mick to talk about the different energies that his brothers, he feels when he thinks his brothers are, it feels like his brothers are around him, Um, that to me felt like acceptance.

And I'm not saying he's probably got to that stage with the death of his brother from last year.

But you know, for, for death of a, a loved one, an example would be being able to say to yourself, I'm so fortunate to have had so many wonderful years with that person and they'll always be in my memories or a breakup or divorce could be ultimately as hard as this has been, this is a healthy choice for me or a healthy result for me.

Um, it's being able to say stuff like that and honestly mean it.

Yeah. Yeah. I wonder whether or not it can sort of like loop back on itself.

Yeah. Well, I think it's really important to add that Kubler -Ros says that with these stages it isn't necessarily a linear process.

You have a month here then a month there and a month there and then you throw it, you can go back, you can jump forward.

It can be all over the place, but they are generally the order of… Yeah.

Okay. It sounds tacky to say, but generally the order of events, they're not linear and you can get stuck for a long time.

And so get stuck but also ...

Relapse. Yeah relapse like that's what we'll get to, acceptance and then return back to anger or denial.

Yes, that's what, yeah.

That's what she means yeah.

Okay so not linear but I think also a lot of people need help with this stuff.

It's not something you can just look at the stage and go okay well I'll just go through those.

You don't have to go through it on your own.

Certainly the example that I will give on another episode sometime when I feel comfortable, I have led heavily on my psychologist to help me through these stages and work through them because it's incredibly hard work.

I felt so many emotions chatting to Mick, but I was really in awe of him and I have gone through that grief cycle three times because of loss of a loved one.

to still be so open to the world is pretty remarkable.

Yeah. That's so true.

Yeah. He's so open to the world.

It's really, it's so inspiring when you meet someone like that, because you know, one of the things that I've, if anyone who has listened to the podcast for a while will know that like one of the things I've often dealt with and trying to kind of like reckon with is like my relationship to success and how it defines you and like what should be what's a good, what's a, I mean everyone's trying to figure this out, but like, what's a, what's a good life or like, how do you feel worthy?

You know, how do you build your self -worth or feel like you're living a meaningful life or whatever it is?

And I think what's so cool about meeting someone like Mick is that until I heard his, met him and heard his story, I mean, I just see him as like, oh, well, he's impressive because he's won so many, he's won world championships and he's a good surfer and he punched a shark and all these things that you hear.

And it's like, wow, that's so what an impressive person.

But actually now having met him, it's like those things kind of like, not pale in comparison, but like they're just so different.

Like, I now see him as the person who told that story and has kind of overcome all that, I'm sure he would take it back if he could.

But the fact that that happened to that has happened to him and is happening to him, and the way that he has the way he's talking about it, the stuff he does for charity, just the person that he is, it's like, well that, that's impressive.

And that is how I'll think about him now.

And it just makes me think about how I want to be as a person and how I want to be in the world.

And it kind of devalues the things that I thought were important a little bit.

Amazing, that's so cool.

Yeah, beautiful. The stoke levels on his parenting was also great to hear as well.

The stoke levels. That's right.

It's a pretty high stoke level as well.

Well, Mick Fanning, Australian icon.

Mates For Life. Yeah.

Mark North East. Iconic.

Iconic Aussie legend.

Yeah. And Mick do call me back.

Do give me a buzz. We do need to lock in that.

Um, that bloody lesson don't we?

If he called you to say, do you want to go surfing?

Would you tell, would you tell me and Josh?

Would I tell you and Josh - No then would you invite us to come as well?

No, no, no, no. No. I'd tell you about it after all.

It was like, Oh no, he's got the kid seats in the back of the castle and room for two people.

Sorry, mate. What if, what if he said, do you want your mates to come as well from the podcast?

Uh, I'd say, I'd say, I don't think they surf.

Not like you and me.

Not like us, mate. I don't think they're as tubular as we are.

What if he said, oh, after that, we should get him down for a bolter?

Yeah, no. Get you to the bolter.

OK, thanks. Now let us have our moment in the surf, and then, yeah, come down for the post drinks.

Thank you. Sure. I'm going to smash a few cans.

That would be good.

Yeah, thanks. Cool, man.

See you there. That would be good.

Actually, can't wait now.

Cool. I feel like it's actually happening.

Oh, good. Thanks, Nick.

Thank you. Hugh, it's Ryan.

I really wanna chase Mick up on that chat we were having about going up for a surf together so I was gonna send him a voice note but I just don't want it to come across like I'm I don't know like, trying to be someone I'm not or like Well, I don't understand like it's false, but I want to, I want him to think I'm cool.

You know, whatever.

So I just sort of, if I could tell you what I'm going to say, then just let me know if you think it's too much.

Okay. This is what I want to say.

Mick! What's up, bro?

It's you boy. Shell dog.

Yeah. No, I had to call because the waves were firing this morning, like absolute bombs, like full Mack and Swell rolling through.

I was so amped, but like first wave.

I totally perled and got ragdolled like full over the falls man like proper wipeout shit for real Yeah But then I hit like this Cheetah five and got shacked in this Tubular little section and thought I was sweet until I bogged it like a total Barney Boards got the fattest ding but whatever still fighting for a gnarly sesh tomorrow if you can but hit me back Legend Whatever you reckon Yeah, it's shell dog So yeah, Hugh, if you think that's alright let's give me a thumbs up.

It's Ryan Shelton from The P despondent podcast.

To call back, press 22 to replay message.

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Visit patreon .com slash the imperfects.

The imperfects is hosted and produced by Hugh van Carlinburg, Ryans Shelton and Josh van Carlinburg.

Our executive producer is Brigitte Northeast assistant producer of Bella Northeast.

This episode is edited by George Martin with music from No Mono.

The Imperfects is not a licensed mental health service and is not a substitute for professional mental health advice, treatment or assessment.

The advice given in this episode is general in nature, but if you're struggling please see a healthcare professional or call Lifeline on 13 11 14.

[The Resilience and Vulnerability of Mick Fanning: A Journey Through Tragedy and Triumph]-[Mick Fanning - Riding The Waves of Loss]

📋 Summary

The Resilience and Vulnerability of Mick Fanning: A Journey Through Tragedy and Triumph

The Weight of Tragedy and the Strength of Character

Surfing as a Spiritual Anchor

The Philosophy of "Controlling the Controllables"

Community and the Call to Action

Understanding the Stages of Grief

Conclusion

🎯Key Sentences

📝Key Phrases

📖 Transcript