HEALING WAVES

-Exploring how modern medicine is reconnecting with the ocean in the treatment of PTSD and other conditions.

How Waves Heal 

There is a reason people turn to the ocean when life becomes heavy. Not for answers, exactly — but for relief. For rhythm. To return to something older than us, to a place our ancestors knew long before technology, where the body remembers how to breathe. 

Across cultures and generations, the sea has been a place of solace. Long before neuroscience existed, people understood instinctively that water calms, movement regulates, and rhythm restores. Today, modern science is beginning to explain why the ocean feels the way it does — and how waves may play a role in healing mental health, trauma, and stress. 

Rhythm 

Modern life is fast, fragmented, and relentlessly loud. Trauma — whether acute or accumulated — does not live solely in memory; it lodges in the body. Anxiety tightens the chest. Stress shortens the breath. Depression flattens time and dulls sensation. 

The ocean offers rhythm in a world that has lost it. 

The rise and fall of swell, the predictable chaos of sets, the repetition of paddling out and duck-diving under waves — all of it provides steady sensory input that helps regulate the nervous system. Breath slows. Muscles release. Attention narrows. The body begins to move from a heightened state of alert into something calmer and more coherent. 

Surfing is not meditation, but it creates similar conditions: focus, repetition, physical exertion, and presence. These are the very ingredients known to support nervous system regulation. 

The same feeling can be achieved simply by sitting in the waves at the water’s edge. You don’t need to surf if it isn’t for you. Swimming, wading, or even standing in small waves creates this same rhythm of peace. 

Alpha Waves 

Neuroscience gives us a useful lens to understand this effect. The brain operates through electrical activity known as brainwaves, measured using EEG (electroencephalogram) — a test that uses electrodes on the scalp to detect and record the brain’s electrical patterns. 

Among these, alpha waves — oscillating at roughly 8–12 Hz — are associated with calm alertness, creativity, reduced anxiety, and meditative states. 

Alpha waves sit between wakefulness and sleep. They are present when the mind is relaxed but engaged — not overstimulated, not switched off. This is precisely how many people describe being in or near the ocean. 

Research has shown that listening to gentle ocean sounds can encourage alpha-wave activity. The rhythmic crash and retreat of waves, or binaural beats designed to mimic alpha frequencies, have been found to reduce stress and promote relaxation. While ocean waves are physical movements of water and alpha waves are electrical activity in the brain, their effects align. Both introduce rhythm. Both quieten mental noise. Both bring the system into balance. 

When surfers describe being “in the zone,” they are often describing an alpha-dominant state: focused, calm, embodied, and present. 

Presence Is Forced 

You cannot scroll while surfing. You cannot replay old arguments or rehearse future fears when a set is stacking on the horizon. When a big set rolls in, nothing else exists. 

Presence in the water is not optional — it’s survival. 

This enforced attentiveness is central to the healing process. Trauma often pulls people out of their bodies as a protective mechanism, creating dissociation and numbness. Surfing reverses this gently but decisively. Cold water on skin.Butterlys in the stomach during a big swell. The sound of whitewater. The brief, electric moment of standing up. 

For seconds — sometimes minutes — there is only what is happening now. 

That return to the body is profound. It reconnects sensation, movement, and awareness in a way that talk alone often cannot. 

Failure without Judgment 

Surfing is full of failure. Missed waves. Late drops. Wipeouts. Long paddles for nothing. And yet, the ocean does not judge. 

You fall. You surface. You paddle back out. 

For people carrying shame, self-criticism, or the aftereffects of trauma, this matters. The sea teaches resilience without punishment. There are consequences, but not condemnation. You don’t have to perform. You don’t have to succeed. You just keep going. 

Healing isn’t linear. Neither is surfing. 

From Intuition to Intervention 

What surfers have long known intuitively is now being explored in structured, evidence-informed ways. 

Ocean-based therapies are increasingly used as complementary treatments — not replacements — alongside established psychological approaches such as trauma-focused Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) and Eye Movement Desensitisation. Reprocessing (EMDR), both recommended by the UK’s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) for PTSD. 

In the UK, charities such as The Wave Project have delivered award-winning surf therapy programmes for young people struggling with anxiety, depression, and trauma. Some of these initiatives have been supported through NHS-funded pilot schemes at a local trust level. 

For military veterans, ocean therapy has been explored through partnerships between health services and charities, recognising the benefits of movement, camaraderie, and exposure to natural environments. 

Internationally, The National Institutes of Health (NIH) in the United States have supported research into surf and ocean therapy, often in collaboration with non-profits such as Operation Surf, contributing to a growing evidence base. 

In Australia, Headspace, the national youth mental health foundation, has partnered with organisations like Waves of Wellness (WOW) to deliver free, evidence-based surf programmes for young people. These initiatives use the ocean not as a cure, but as a conduit — a medium through which therapeutic outcomes become more accessible. 

At a broader level, the European Union’s Horizon 2020-funded SOPHIE Project explored the intrinsic links between ocean health and human health, calling for global frameworks that recognise the sea as a public health asset. 

Why This Matters Now 

Rates of anxiety, depression, burnout, and trauma-related disorders are rising. Disconnection is common. Many people feel trapped in their heads, overwhelmed by information but starved of meaning and sensation. 

Surfing is not therapy. It does not replace professional care, medication, or structured treatment. But it can be a powerful companion — a space where people learn to regulate, reconnect, and remember how it feels to be present. 

The more natural therapies we can find to complement care and reduce reliance on pharmaceuticals, the better.  

The science supports what surfers have long felt: rhythm matters. Presence matters. Nature matters. 

Waves don’t care who you are. They simply ask that you join their rhythm — the rhythm of nature — and sometimes, that is enough.