P540 Meets Scuba Diving

San Francisco, Pompano Beach, Florida Work and Diving Trip Week

I had the pleasure of spending a week attending several training courses with my new team and then I went to Pompano Beach, Florida for a quick 3 days of diving.

My diving buddy Chris L and I dove with lighthouse dives. I took a red eye on Thursday night and arrived in Pompano Beach on Friday. Chris picked me up; we had breakfast and then slept till 1 pm that day. Of course, we were too lazy to do a beach dive that day.

Saturday September 24th we did two boat trips (morning and afternoon). The visibility was excellent and we had a blast. We did only one boat dive on Sunday. During my diving trip, I could not resist reflecting on the P540 course I am currently taking. At this point, we have covered radical behaviorism, Bandura’s self-efficacy theory, and Cognitive Information processing.

Couple of key items came to mind. The first one is Bandura’s self-efficacy “…people make judgments about their ability to perform certain actions required to achieve a desirable outcome Driscoll, p.316” We were placed on the advanced boat. The advanced boat consisted of experienced divers and it took us to deeper dives locations. Since I have not dived in 3 months I was a little hesitant regarding whether I would remember how to achieve the same comfort levels as I had done previously. Using joking as an assurance policy, my buddy kept reminding me diving is like riding a bike. You just do not forget how. In this case, Chris was my self-efficacy stimulus. In addition, using visualization techniques of safe descents and ascents I was happy to see that yes diving is like riding a bike.

I also realized that automaticity was a key factor in my ability to put my gear together and achieve buoyancy without many conscious efforts. I do recall when I first started diving, I was simply like a yo-yo, one second I am at 30 feet and the other I am the surface. This became more evident, as we were asked to take a beginner diver with us as her buddy became seasick. She was very comfortable in the water and of course had the yo-yo issue. Fortunately, we dived a shallow reef and her yo-yo effects were not a big risk factor. One of the key items in CIP is the fact that students need to take the time and effort to properly practice their skill. “Perfect practice makes perfect.” I was fortunate enough to start diving with other exceptionally experienced divers. Their prototyping gave me the solid foundation of what it means to be totally neutral. I hope Chris and I allowed our new friend to realize what it means to be totally neutral.

Note: The pictures were taken by Joe M. Please do not copy these pictures for any use.