A simple accomplishment...

Just before I fell off the grid for a week, my good friend and dive buddy on many dives, Aaron Oaks posted that he had just completed the epic accomplishment of 200 logged dives.  Since I had been made aware that posting in the 100's is a big deal (on the 100th and 1000th dive you are supposed to make the dive naked or so they tell me) I wondered if on the Isle Royale would I make a century dive. 

As it turns out, if I worked a little at it I could.  I needed to double up on two of the dive sites. As it worked out, the rebreather let me do two additional dives as no decompression dives even though the previous dive had been to normal no decompression limits and my surface interval was about 10 minutes including the time at the safety stop.  Love theses machines. 

On the last dive of the trip, on the epic dive site known as the Chisholm Engine,  I made my 3600th logged dive with Jill Synowiec, Wayne Rush, Jack Papas, Monica Dobies with Jesse Rush and Capt. Ryan Staley watching topside.  The trip was epic and the pictures will be posted at the Divers Incorporated Blog in the coming days on on the Divers inc Facebook pages.

 Hope you are along with me on the destination for the 3700th dive... if my life is consistent it should be in Bonaire...   March 2017.. you need to be there.

The problem with raising your standards

Since the CDTC I have been faced with a dilemma.

While I was in Punta Cana, the people that I associated with were of the highest caliber.  True, we were all working towards a purpose, but the true character of truly remarkable people emerged.  The dilemma I face is that I want them daily in my life without any possibility of that happening.

While I have talked or communicated with most of the Aquanauties on an almost daily basis since the CDTC and have had some awesome times with others, I find that I am setting the bar in my daily interactions to that standard.  In some cases, such as my wife, manager and many friends it is an easy goal to achieve, in others I find that they just don't stack up.  Many are ok with me helping them achieve greatness, others are content with mediocrity.  Some would rather bring me down to their level rather than allow me to bring them up to mine. It is hard to explain other than this: While the awesomeness is amazing, the mediocrity is frustrating... hence my dilemma.

This evening I spent a couple of hours with someone who is truly of a remarkable caliber.  I had not seen her since we both graduated high school together 30 years ago. The conversation that we had was if we had never parted and it gave me another characteristic of a truly remarkable human being. In the conversation afterwards my wife and I tried to describe to each other what we had experienced. The answer was simple, events are more important than things, people are more important than events.  What good is a selfie compared to a groupie?  While you may experience a place what does that compare to experiencing a soul?

Philosophy aside the answer is simple.  Spend time with people and put your phone away. Spend time with people because they are awesome.  If you find you are with people and have a desire to be elsewhere, change your people.  

The simple explanation is this:

If people make you better, spend time with them.....if people need help, help them... if people are beyond help, spend some time trying to encourage them and do what you can for them... if people are destructive and negative, thank them and move on.