Second time we went I didn't reach five feet down before I started having a panic attack. It reminds me of that episode of The Simpsons where they win a trip to Hawaii. Marge has anxiety about flying, and just as the plane is about to leave, she gets out of her seat and runs from one end of the plane to the other yelling " lemme out, lemme out. Lemme out, lemme out" until the commercial break. Anyway, I went back to the boat and chilled with... Shit I forget his name, but we a talked about Jamaican lifestyle vs. Canadian lifestyle. Quite the difference with the some similarities.
When the dive was done our guide Yogi took me and Leah aside and told her she did excellent and wanted her to get certified, and asked me what happened. I told him and he said he wanted to take us again. He didn't wasn't that to be my last experience with scuba. I agreed and we went again the next day.
Third dive, over coming whatever the hell I feared the previous day. Jumped in the water, started feeling trapped again... Yogi told me to stick my head in the water and pretend I was snorkeling, after few minutes of that... BOOM... Started decending down the rope, nerves went away, and I was relaxed. By the time I was down to the ocean floor I had conquered that fear... sank down to 25 feet, achieved bouyancy and we were off... Seen so much marine life, rays, lion fish, eels... BEST DIVE EVER. I know I've only dived three times, but that was awesome.
I have the greatest respect for Yogi for helping me conquer that mental block, or fear or whatever you wanted to call it.
No comments:
Post a Comment