Cyrus Sutton

Cyrus Sut­ton is a Cal­i­for­nia surfer / film­maker who is the cre­ator of Kor­duroy TV. In addi­tion to being an extremely tal­ented surfer, Cyrus is all about doing-it-yourself, from hand planes to organ­ics. We asked Cyrus what it is that makes him tick.

What was your life like grow­ing up?
My par­ents divorced when I was a baby and I spent my early years between my mom’s in Long Beach, where she’s a pro­fes­sor at Cal State Long Beach, and my dad’s in Fuller­ton, an inland Orange County sub­urb where he’d been raised and returned to after col­lege because of its cen­tral loca­tion to the moun­tains, the beach and his teach­ing at Cal Poly Pomona. I didn’t grow up with much of a con­nec­tion to the ocean, but rather the moun­tains. My dad was an avid fish­er­man who built me my first fly rod when I was 9. We’d spend sum­mers in the East­ern Sier­ras hik­ing and pulling trout out of the clear streams with the flies he’d tied over the winter.

Tell us more…
My first expe­ri­ences with the ocean were far less roman­tic. I was scared to death of it until I was 8 and before that wouldn’t even go into our com­mu­nity pool with­out a float strapped to my back, inflat­able water wings around my arms and a boo­gie board. It was pretty funny, but that’s what I needed to find my com­fort zone. When I grad­u­ated to the surf, it was at Seal Beach with my best friend on a boo­gie board. We called our­selves the “boo­gie men” and had a lit­tle pseudo-superhero theme song we’d chant when pad­dling out. We were so stoked. The next sum­mer we started rid­ing longboards.

But shortly after, my dad got an exchange teach­ing job at the Kyushu Insti­tute of Design in Japan. I nor­mally lived with my mom, but my dad thought it would be an oppor­tu­nity of a life­time so I went. It was intense. Going from being dri­ven to school in Cal­i­for­nia to a place where I had to nav­i­gate my bike through an urban labyrinth before board­ing a bul­let train that sped me to a mega-terminal where I’d have to find my con­nect­ing sub­way train. The whole process took about 90 min­utes each way and school wasn’t any eas­ier. I didn’t speak a word of Japan­ese and the classes were gru­el­ing. By the time I left, I was pretty much trau­ma­tized by the whole ordeal and plunged myself into surf­ing, which took me back to a place where things made sense.

When did you get your first surf­board?
Before Japan, my dad walked me into Har­bour Surf­boards and we ordered my first board.

Who did you look up to and admire when you were a young man?
My heroes were surf stars, like Joel Tudor and Rob Machado, who seemed to have a super­nat­ural con­nec­tion with ocean and that was inspiring.

Who/what inspires you now?
Any­one who can sort through all of bs out there, and find an inter­nal space or state of mind that works for them. Not just liv­ing out other people’s val­ues or expec­ta­tions, but dis­till­ing their pri­or­i­ties down to things that ful­fill them—taking the leap to truly under­stand who they really are. For me, this has cre­ated a deep sense of con­tent­ment and I think oper­at­ing from this place opens the door to every­thing in life—at least it works that way for me. So that “place” is my inspiration.

Tell us about your lat­est film Tom’s Cre­ation Plan­ta­tion…
The goal of the film is to con­vey the infec­tious enthu­si­asm of Tom Wegener, a guy who’s found what makes him happy in his own proudly kooky way. By oper­at­ing from his “place,” he stum­bled upon a pre­vi­ously for­got­ten appendage of surf­ing and believed in it when most surfers wouldn’t have the balls to advo­cate such a unlikely form of surf­ing: the alaia. The alaia is a plank of wood with no buoy­ancy. The surf craft works sheerly because of the sur­face ten­sion cre­ated by wave-generated momen­tum and the plan­ing sur­face of its outline.

What is the great­est thing you have learned in your life?
That every­thing in life is rel­a­tive. In other words, we only per­ceive some­thing as good if its com­par­a­tively bet­ter than what we’ve expe­ri­enced before. If I try to fight this nat­ural ten­dency with my mind, then I’m con­stantly engaged in a men­tal strug­gle to be grate­ful. I find I’m much more con­tent and informed if I’m not strug­gling to be grate­ful all of the time.

By just let­ting life hap­pen to me, I am less attached to the pos­i­tive and neg­a­tive sit­u­a­tions that arise and I am able to just under­stand the lessons they con­tain. The lessons are the same for all us and whether you are rich/poor, handsome/ugly, etc., it’s how we react to those lessons that deter­mine our qual­ity of life. Feel­ings of guilt over hav­ing “more” than oth­ers or envy over hav­ing “less” dis­ap­pear because you real­ize that peo­ple who have it easy in some areas are going to be more chal­lenged in other areas. So the real­iza­tion that every­thing is rel­a­tive has allowed me not to feel oblig­ated to fol­low any­one else’s rules or feel guilty about find­ing my own path to contentment.

What are you most proud of?
I’m most proud of myself when I’m able to let things go I can­not con­trol. If you’ve read this inter­view up to this point, you can tell that I think a lot about shit and that has screwed me up a lot in the past. So when I’m able to just feel out where I want to go and let go of my own expec­ta­tions, I can let my over-active brain exist in the moment and work for me, not against me.

What mean­ing does surf­ing hold for you and how has it changed your life?
At first, surf­ing was an escape. Then, in high school, it was a way to be cool and get girls. For a brief sec­ond, it was a career. And now it is a teacher.

What brings you the most hap­pi­ness in the world?
Surf­ing, explor­ing, shar­ing, eat­ing and being around the energy of strong women.

Who are some of the peo­ple you feel are shap­ing the path for surf­ing today?
The mass of peo­ple going to beach to find an escape from their nor­mal lives. Their num­bers are grow­ing daily and they are dra­mat­i­cally alter­ing the surfing’s path. While it’s got obvi­ous draw­backs (less waves for me), it is a chance for humans gain new a appre­ci­a­tion of the ocean on a larger scale. And if we as surfers open our minds to what are ride­able waves, then there’s plenty for every­one. These are excit­ing times.

What is your favorite board? Your favorite surf spot?
My 4’10″ block of foam cut with a hand­saw from a soft top blank—no fins, no stringer, no glass. And the surf spot is any­where that allows me to catch a good amount of waves and get in a rhythm.

What’s your favorite meal?

Steamed veg­gies and pota­toes with ham­burger made into lit­tle meat balls driz­zled with my sesame sauce goes down real nice and makes me feel good the next day.

What are you cur­rently lis­ten­ing to on your iPod?
Right now I don’t own an iPod and I’m just enjoy­ing silence. But I love live music.

What causes/organizations do you sup­port?
I don’t really sup­port any causes or orga­ni­za­tions, not that there aren’t a lot of amaz­ing peo­ple band­ing together to do a lot of impor­tant and pos­i­tive things. I’m just an advo­cate of empow­er­ing your­self. I think if every­body took the time to empower them­selves first before try­ing to save some cute endan­gered species, we’d solve the real prob­lem at its source. I make films and have a web­site that’s about doing some­thing to that effect, so I guess that’s my con­tri­bu­tion and what helps me sleep at night.

What are you most grate­ful for?
I’m grate­ful for any­thing I didn’t have before. Then once I’ve had it for a while, I stop being as grate­ful. But that’s the won­der­ful thing about life—its always offer­ing new chal­lenges and hard­ships, and thus new oppor­tu­ni­ties to be grateful.

What’s next for Cyrus Sut­ton?
Going to eat din­ner with my girlfriend’s fam­ily. It’s her dad’s birth­day and I’m mak­ing the salad. Then we’re going to play Balder­dash, which I’ve never played but it sounds like fun.

Cyrus is involved with Kor­duroy TV and U Grow Organ­ics. Trailer to Tom’s Cre­ation Plan­ta­tion. The Kor­duroy TV trailer can be found here and Cyrus Long­board­ing on an Almond Log.

Photo cred­its: 1. Ryan Tatar, 2. Jack Chellemi, 3. Foto Pero, 4. Dan Llano, 5. + 6. Ryan Tatar.