My thoughts ... in no particular order.
I'm a non-GUE diver who's taken Fundies (twice, actually) and decided to pursue other directions ... I found the structure a bit limiting, and the chronic self-critiquing gets on my nerves sometimes. But that's more a personality issue than one of diving ... it's not for everybody. That said, I benefitted a great deal from having taken the class and learning a bit about the "how" and "why" of the DIR approach.
I've dived with a LOT of GUE and UTD trained divers ... including several who are participating in this thread ... and have found them to be as varied, interesting, and almost universally nice as every other group of divers I've ever come to know. Many I call friends ... for reasons that have little or nothing to do with diving.
The best instructor I ever took a class from was, at one time, a GUE instructor. Today he doesn't teach ... in fact, I think he doesn't even dive anymore. I sure miss Joe. He taught me a great deal ... not just about diving, but about how to be the best instructor I can be.
The best mentor and dive buddy I ever had was GUE trained. He taught me how to think about diving. I never once heard him sound elitist ... in fact, he's a real humble guy with a great sense of humor.
I did my first 650 or so dives in split fins ... Apollo Biofins. Loved those things. I could frog kick in them just fine. Learned how to helicopter in them as well. Dived silty places like Cove 2 hundreds of times without an issue. Never could learn to make them go backwards ... although I think all you'd need to do so would be a couple pieces of duct tape up the middle of each fin. At some point I decided to try blade fins ... Turtles. At first I hated 'em ... felt like somebody tied a couple logs to my feet.. After a dozen dives, feeling the difference in precision and feedback I was getting, I decided I liked them just fine. Got about 2500 dives on blades now, and wouldn't even think about switching back to splits.
I was out diving with a couple friends the other night. Between the three of us we've taken training from at least eight different agencies. Two of us have had some level of GUE training ... the other is mostly PADI, with some NSS-CDS cave training and some IANTD tech classes tossed in. Looking at our gear, you'd be hard-put to figure out which was trained by whom ... all three of us were in red and black drysuits, all of us were using backplates/wings and long hose, bungeed backup regs, and all of us were kicking blade fins ... and not a snorkel to be seen among us. We don't use that equipment because some agency told us to ... we use it because it works well for the type of diving we do.
If it works for you, why not take your training with an agency that can teach you how to use it properly? It might cost a bit more, but it also shortens the learning curve. What you do after the class is really up to you ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
I have absolutly nothing to add to this. I just wanted to repost it for those who may have missed a great post.