This is first and foremost a metaphor.
Think of the pictures you have seen of surfers riding the waves.
They seem to have a special sense of when is the exact right moment to jump on their board and start the ride; too soon and they can be washed under, and too late they flub.
They find balance points between giant waves and ride them through narrow openings between the turbulence of the peaks and valleys.
It takes a lot of practice and research on waves to develop the sense of how to do it.
And surfers are always thinking about the waves and looking for new ways to ride them.
They learn how the shape of the shoreline and the rocks hidden in the deep affect the movements
of the waves and adjust their approach to match. It is a beauty to watch.
In innovation, the waves represent movements of possibilities.
Some possibilities develop a momentum and a form as they gather believers and followers.
There are many waves of possibilities moving toward the horizon we call the future. Sometimes they clash and cancel, sometimes they reinforce.
Like the surfer, the innovator develops a feel for the movements of these possibility waves, a sense of how to ride their balance points, and a sense of when it is too early or too late to join a wave.
Reality is more complicated.
Ocean surfers ride waves but do not alter them.
The history surfer worries not only how to ride existing possibilities but to generate new ones to ride after that.