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The Silent Retreat

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A conversation between two way cooler than me California women about a type of retreat where there is no conversation – a silent retreat – and I immediately recognized a parallel in my own world – scuba diving. That’s scuba diving, I shouted out without hesitation, and suddenly I gained respect as more than the nerdy girl taking pictures underwater who can’t stop talking about the unusual creatures that reside there.

Each dive really is a mini silent retreat. My head goes under, and for an hour or more, depending on air consumption and the mood of the guide, I have to keep my mouth shut. Chiuso (I love Italian words). I have logged more than 600 dives which somehow adds up to almost a month of silence underwater.

A whole month to consciously look inside myself or rather outside myself. But I am not exactly sure what the rules of a silent retreat are (I guess no talking) and more importantly what may constitute breaking the rules of a silent retreat. There is a lot that one can say for example with the raising of a single eyebrow (if you can do that).

Scuba diving is not performed without some form of communication. You can’t scream about having just seen a whaleshark but you can pump a fist. At the same time, just seeing one leaves you speechless and reverent. There are for sure some serious hand signals, the OK sign and how much air do you have, and the not so serious, for a pygmy seahorse or a frogfish. Guides sometimes have some kind of noisemaker to catch our attention for something special but I am not a fan of these because, well, they break the silence. I have watched a hearing impaired couple underwater converse beautifully because for them, there was nothing to adjust.

You are forced to experience the world around you without speaking a word for an hour, but it is speaking to you.

There was a moment on a dive near Kri Island in Indonesia when anything that could swim vanished before me in an instant. The fish silently disappeared in unison. I held my breath, waited, and contemplated what might be coming while looking worriedly at the suddenly empty deep blue water scene in front of me. A boat? Something big but not a boat? A natural disaster? It was a silent but somehow not silent school of eagle rays which disappeared as quickly as they arrived. Did we really see that?, I asked myself. I was the only creature who was unaware that they were coming. Yet, I knew something was up as I watched the instantaneous disappearance of the dense cloud of life which a moment before had been parading before me.

Subtle cues communicate action all around us. When is it, that magic moment when a pair of mandarinfish know it is time to mate, that exact moment at sunset when the right amount of sunlight remains sending them in a panic search for a mate, and then the chance to mate is over until 24 hours later when the same moment occurs again.

A cuttlefish makes no sound but rapidly executes a series of color and texture changes either to camouflage itself, or to scare or to potentially hypnotize you. And if none of that works to frighten you away, it will release a bit of black smoke and disappear as if by magic. Still in silence.

Thousands of sardines will swim around you in organized silence until someone in the group makes an abrupt switch. The change is still silent, like a silent symphony.

Ironically sound travels better through the sea than air. You can hear a parrotfish scraping its perfectly evolved teeth on the coral to feed on the algae. Or a humpback whale song sung by a whale which is nowhere in sight. It will stay in your mind forever if you listen for it.

Silence in the ocean is an attribute. No one hears a shark. A frogfish sits and watches like a sphinx. Divers will even see more if they remain calm.

So I could report to my two very cool Californian acquaintances that I have been going to the ultimate in silent retreats for years. Perhaps a little more intermittent rather than a week of silence or even a full day of silence. But there is no TV, no internet, no iPod tunes, nothing to distract you from viewing the world in which you are literally immersed in silence.

Janice Nigro is an avid scuba diver with a PhD in biology.  She is a scientist who has studied the development of human cancer at universities in the USA and Norway, and has discovered the benefits of artistic expression through underwater photography and story writing of her travel adventures.

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The BiG Scuba Podcast Episode 173: DEEP – Making Humans Aquatic

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Gemma and Ian visited DEEP and were hosted by Phil Short, Research Diving, Training Lead, and were given a tour of the facility at Avonmouth and then over to the Campus at Tidenham.

DEEP is evolving how humans access, explore and inhabit underwater environments. Through flexible, modular and mobile subsea habitats that allow humans to live undersea up to 200m for up to 28 days, work-class submarines, and advanced human performance research, DEEP completely transforms what we are capable of underwater and how we conduct undersea science and research.

www.deep.com

You can listen to Episode 173 of the BiG Scuba Podcast here.

We hope you have enjoyed this episode of The BiG Scuba Podcast.  Please give us ★★★★★, leave a review, and tell your friends about us as each share and like makes a difference.   Contact Gemma and Ian with your messages, ideas and feedback via The BiG Scuba Bat Phone    +44 7810 005924   or use our social media platforms.   To keep up to date with the latest news, follow us:

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We are on Facebook                      @thebigscuba

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The BiG Scuba Website                  www.thebigscuba.com

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Visit   https://www.patreon.com/thebigscubapodcast and subscribe – Super quick and easy to do and it makes a massive difference. Thank you.

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The BiG Scuba Podcast Episode 172: Dr. Joseph Dituri

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Joseph Dituri

Gemma and Ian chat to Dr. Joseph Dituri. Dr. Jospeh Dituri lived undersea for 100 Days in a mission combining education, ocean conservation research, and the study of the physiological and psychological effects of compression on the human body.  

Dituri enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1985. He served continuously on active service upon various ships and shore stations where he was involved in every aspect of diving and special operations work from saturation diving and deep submergence to submersible design and clearance diving. Now that he is retired from 28 years of active service to the United States, he is the president of the International Board of Undersea Medicine. He also volunteers his time as the CEO of the Association for Marine Exploration. He is an invited speaker on motivational, sea and space related topics.

Fuelled by his passion for exploration, discovery, adventure, and making the greatest possible positive contribution to the world, he is fighting for change in a big way and with great enthusiasm.

You can listen to Episode 172 of the BiG Scuba Podcast here.

www.drdeepsea.com

We hope you have enjoyed this episode of The BiG Scuba Podcast.  Please give us ★★★★★, leave a review, and tell your friends about us as each share and like makes a difference.   Contact Gemma and Ian with your messages, ideas and feedback via The BiG Scuba Bat Phone    +44 7810 005924   or use our social media platforms.   To keep up to date with the latest news, follow us:

We are on Instagram                     @thebigscuba  

We are on Facebook                      @thebigscuba  

We are in LinkedIn                          https://www.linkedin.com/in/ian%F0%9F%A6%88-last-325b101b7/

The BiG Scuba Website                  www.thebigscuba.com

Amazon Store :                                https://www.amazon.co.uk/shop/thebigscuba

Visit   https://www.patreon.com/thebigscubapodcast and subscribe – Super quick and easy to do and it makes a massive difference. Thank you.

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