Since I’ve started working as a scuba instructor I’ve had the privilege of teaching a number of people to dive, and certifying them as scuba divers. Earlier this month, though, I got the chance for the first time to certify a friend from my old life.
Samara works at my old law firm. I actually interviewed her when she was looking for a job out of law school, and I liked her enough to give her a good review, which led to her offer. She worked in a different department than me, so we didn’t see each other daily, but we were always friendly. When I joined the website Facebook, she was soon added as a friend, and we exchanged a few emails, catching up.
In December I got an email from Samara, telling me that she and her boyfriend were coming down to Cayman to get certified. They had already done their classroom and pool work up in New York, but needed to do their open water dives. Of course, I was anxious to be their instructor. There was one small problem, though — I am a PADI (Professional Association of Dive Instructors) instructor, and they began the certification process with SSI (Scuba Schools International). This is not a huge deal — ultimately all of the dive associations follow very similar standards — but it did mean that I had to register as a referral instructor with SSI, which opened me up to having to do SSI referrals in the future. But I figured it was worth it to be able to do the dives with Samara, so I did my paperwork and signed up as an SSI Referral Instructor.
Samara and her boyfriend Josh came down at the beginning of January, and in terms of weather, their timing couldn’t be worse. There was a Nor’wester in town, which makes the water at my shop very choppy. We had to delay the dves for a few days until the water calmed. While this was a wise move, I don’t think it did much to help Samara’s nerves. She was admittedly very nervous about doing the open water dives. Fortunately for her, she was heading out with the best instructor on island!
I make that comment about me being the best jokingly, but I actually do think I’m pretty good at what I do. One of the strengths I have that many others don’t is helping people who are nervous, or who lack a little confidence. I’m very patient and understanding as an instructor, and I know that a positive experience and a little positive affirmation can make all the difference in terms of whether someone loves or hates diving, or whether they pass the certification dives or have to go back for more training. I recently had an example of this with another person I certified, a girl named Madel. Madel lives on island, and is comfortable in the water, but wasn’t sure how she’d like scuba diving. Before doing her certification course, I took her out for a “discover scuba” dive, and she was awful. She had trouble equalizing, could not get down below 15 feet, and was just really uncomfrtable. She liked it enough to want to pursue certification, and I was dreading teaching the class with her. But I figured that since she was a good swimmer and comfortable in the water, all she really needed was confidence to get her going. During the course of our training, I worked on building her confidence (which was hard, because in the beginning she was just not good), and by the end of the course she was comfortable, confident, and a good diver, and she got certified! I was proud of her, but also proud of myself because it reflects on my ability to teach. Many instructors (including some in my shop) would have written her off from that first experience, and advised her that diving wasn’t for her. I was patient with her and worked to giver her positives to focus on despite the fact that there were some dives that she really struggled on, and in the end it worked! Go me!
As it turns out, despite her nervousness, Samara did not have any of the problems that Madel had, and did not need that confidence building. All she needed was to get that first dive under her belt, and she was hooked. Diving is such a unique and wonderful experience, and even though it’s cool to get in a pool and swim around with scuba gear, nothing compares to being out in the ocean on a dive. It’s absolutely fantastic. Once the weather finally calmed, Samara experienced how great divin was, and instantly her fears and nervousness were behind her. Both she and Josh did great on all of their skills, and I was very excited to be able to do their dives. I was even happier to see that they had caught the diving bug, and were already thinking about other dive trips they could take. It is especially fun when you and your significant other both dive, because you can dive together and be each other’s dive-buddy, and share all of these amazing experiences.
Samara returned to New York, sending my regards to all of my old co-workers, and hopefully with a better understanding of how I could give up a high paying job as a corporate lawyer to spend my days scuba diving. I hope she was able to convey the sentiment to some of my old co-workers and to the partners at my firm, who thought I was completely insane to leave my job to become a scuba instructor.
I only hope that Samara is not the last of my friends and/or former co-workers to come get scuba certified with me! It’s always nice to see a familiar face, but it’s even nicer to share your passion and joy with a friend, and to help to expose them to a world they never knew existed.
So if you’ve ever thought about getting certified as a scuba diver, come down to Cayman and let me (or Andrea) be your instructor. As I’m sure Samara will agree, it’s worth the trip!