Riley Elliott Instagram – I got into sharks because of surfing. It’s the natural fear for most surfers, and to be honest, ignorance is bliss for surfers. It’s the unspoken rule that you just don’t talk shark while in the line up. Where people get separated is what that ignorance is based on. Is it because they literally are ignorant to the risks of the wild environment which the ocean is, and thus react maliciously when scared or hurt by it. Or is that ignorance based on an acceptance of the risks of the wild, an awareness of it, and thus best not to get blinded by the risks but rather embrace the fear as it may be, to be sharper and act as required to survive in the wild. It’s a big difference, and as I say to people with regard to sharks, it’s ok to be fearful, and in fact you should be, but just ensure how you react to fear is in the second manner of things mentioned above. Respect the wild, use fear to acknowledge risks and catalyse instinctual reactions to be sharper, more animal like and void of societal weakness. Surfing taught me this lesson long before I employed it with sharks. Drowning is far more likely than a shark bite. Smashing your face into the reef is a real possibility. Slicing your body open on your fins, getting stung by deadly jellies are all possible. Suffice to say this trip away to Indonesia has been a great counter fix to my shark life but equally they are one in the same. When it got big, there’s fear, consequence and you can use those circumstances to go one of two ways. Which way do you go?