Part One ~ When to practice: "been there done that" or "yesterday, today and tomorrow"
Is practicing skills something you did initially to get certified ~or~ is skill acquisition, refinement and reinforcement an ongoing and integral part of your diving?
Many folks having only minimal practice with basic skills during initial certification proceed to dive in challenging open water settings. As time goes on the dives get progressively more demanding and the potential for catastrophe increases dramatically.
But there never was a development of skill and conditioned response to emergencies and there is no continuing practice to refresh, hone and enhance skills commensurate with the dives being done.
At the other end of the spectrum there is a relatively small number of divers who have made skill sessions a regular part of their diving experience... some even going so far as to incorporate at least some skill development into every dive.
It might seem to those in the first (and much larger) group that these *fanatics* are missing all of the fun... that they have taken training to be an end in and of itself rather than merely a means to an end! Maybe they have... but maybe they are having fun too.
Let's imagi-graph this:
There is a continuum of sorts between these two polar opposites. From my limited experience it appears to me that the line between these two points does not form a Bell Curve but a (decaying) Exponential Curve and that it is sparsely populated to the right.
Scattered along the line from those whose skill practice sessions are ancient history and those who do nothing but practice skills are those who have fun diving but also indulge to one degree or another in further (though not necessarily formal) training.
A reflective person might ask them self at this point , "Where do I fit on that line?" Further reflection might yield other gems such as, "Where do I fit on the line of dive difficulty plotted over requisite skill... am I even on the chart?!" Adding in a Y axis and plotting fun might yield: "Am I having fun? What could this fun end up costing me? " or "Am I having fun? Have I sacrificed fun for... hey! why am I doing this anyway?"
Is practicing skills something you did initially to get certified ~or~ is skill acquisition, refinement and reinforcement an ongoing and integral part of your diving?
Many folks having only minimal practice with basic skills during initial certification proceed to dive in challenging open water settings. As time goes on the dives get progressively more demanding and the potential for catastrophe increases dramatically.
But there never was a development of skill and conditioned response to emergencies and there is no continuing practice to refresh, hone and enhance skills commensurate with the dives being done.
At the other end of the spectrum there is a relatively small number of divers who have made skill sessions a regular part of their diving experience... some even going so far as to incorporate at least some skill development into every dive.
It might seem to those in the first (and much larger) group that these *fanatics* are missing all of the fun... that they have taken training to be an end in and of itself rather than merely a means to an end! Maybe they have... but maybe they are having fun too.
Let's imagi-graph this:
There is a continuum of sorts between these two polar opposites. From my limited experience it appears to me that the line between these two points does not form a Bell Curve but a (decaying) Exponential Curve and that it is sparsely populated to the right.
Scattered along the line from those whose skill practice sessions are ancient history and those who do nothing but practice skills are those who have fun diving but also indulge to one degree or another in further (though not necessarily formal) training.
A reflective person might ask them self at this point , "Where do I fit on that line?" Further reflection might yield other gems such as, "Where do I fit on the line of dive difficulty plotted over requisite skill... am I even on the chart?!" Adding in a Y axis and plotting fun might yield: "Am I having fun? What could this fun end up costing me? " or "Am I having fun? Have I sacrificed fun for... hey! why am I doing this anyway?"