Sangha of Auspicious Companions

43 Days Alone, Rowing to Hawaii

Kelsey Pfendler pushed off from Monterey, California on May 21 with 2,400 miles (3862 kilometers) of open Pacific Ocean between her and land. 43 days, 17 hours, and 55 minutes later, she rowed into Honolulu Harbor — the fastest person of any gender, and the first American woman, to complete the solo mid-Pacific crossing. Hundreds waited on the dock to greet her, a homecoming that felt almost impossible to absorb. “It was very surreal,” she said. “I think it was hard to soak in that I had actually made it.” A Grand Canyon river guide, Pfendler is someone who has made a life out of reading water — and yet the open ocean offered a different kind of lesson entirely; her journey was vast and humbling in ways a river canyon cannot be. She described the fear, and then, on the calmer days, something else: the sheer immensity of the expansive waters soaking into her. What stays with you is not just the record, but her quiet wish for what comes next — that someday another woman will work even harder and surpass her.

Be The Change

Identify one goal you have quietly talked yourself out of because it seemed too large or too lonely — and write down a single first step you could take this week to begin it.