Never Get Your Scuba License on Vacation


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Never Get Your Scuba License on Vacation

Never get your scuba license on vacation.

That’s life advice from my Uncle Rod, who passed away last month. Before then he’d built a life he wanted and lived to tell it.

In his 20s, Rod was a saturation diver who repaired pipelines in the North Sea. For a month at a time, he and three other men would live in a submersible. Rotating shifts. Depths could be a much as 2000 feet. 

I once asked him if he’d seen the movie Gravity, and he scoffed, “There’s no pressure in space.”

His scuba warning went like this: the typical diving depth while on vacation is in the ballpark of ten meters. At that depth, you gain one additional atmosphere of pressure on your body. Some beginners assume that entry level depth would be the safest.

The thing with it is, that’s not the whole story.

While it may be the minimum depth to get your license, it has the maximum effect on your body. You’ve just doubled your pressure. Going deeper would add incrementally more atmosphere, but with less relative effect. Newlyweds don’t always make that connection; I’ll spare you the symptoms of decompression sickness.

Whether it’s to change careers or just try something new, some of you have come to the surface to get your bearings.  You’ve peeled off your snorkel to take some deep cleansing breaths as the sun hits your face.

Before you go back down to find a different, better-pay-with-shorter-commute reef, remember this: change is indifferent, and it commands respect.

Move too fast and you could break something—more than you were trying to fix by making a change in the first place.

Alternatively, if you aren’t feeling any additional pressure, you’re probably not going deep enough.

That’s why change is hard. 

Now plug your nose.

P.S. Rod would want to add there’s a fantastic movie about diving called Last Breath. Trust me, you’ll love it.


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