I Learned to Dive

by Isabella Dawson

I learned how to dive at 25 years old.

This weekend we celebrated my younger sister’s birthday with a trip to Anna Maria Island. We rented a gorgeous coastal house and planned a weekend of relaxation and fun by the pool. Then, I did something that had intimidated me in my childhood.

It was a mental block that had followed me into adulthood, the fear of diving into water. You may scoff and think: this is ridiculous, but this is something I have never imagined to accomplish, let alone try to do.

The pool games started and ‘categories’ of course had to be played, everyone began to wonder why I was jumping in after people like a sprawled out maniac rather than diving in to tag them. Well, because I’ve never learned how to dive.

After some mild peer pressure and encouragement, with everyone showing off how they were able to dive, I thought, “This is it, I will try to dive.” I started in the shallow end on the steps, doing little jumps to get comfortable putting myself headfirst in the water. But then, when I stood up on the edge of the pool, I physically couldn’t make myself do it. Looking down in the water I could only think of what could go wrong: how I was probably going to get water up my nose and in my mouth and smack my belly and legs on the water’s surface. But, the relentless need to face this fear persisted in me.

So I continued practicing in the shallow end. Eventually, I started getting comfortable with the fact that I wouldn’t die going headfirst into the water. As soon as I felt an inkling of courage, I hoisted out of the pool, walked over to the edge of the deep end, and I dove in.

And I fucking did it.

I felt like a little kid when I burst up through the water with a wide smile on my face, everyone cheering for me. It reminded me of going to the pool when I was young and telling my mom, “Watch this!” and then doing something I thought was really cool to get her to say a (probably very exaggerated for the underwhelming thing I was doing) “Good job, Honey!” I couldn’t believe I did it. This had been something that I had feared and desperately failed to brush off when brought up by others in the past, desperately trying to play casual, like I just didn’t want to learn. But over the weekend, I became obsessed with conquering this fear, alongside margaritas, corn hole tournaments, and soaking in the hot tub that is.

I dove into this pool approximately 20 times. And let me tell you, it wasn’t smooth sailing every time. I have the bruises speckled on my legs to prove it, many belly flops and nose fulls of water occurred. It became a running joke that I was training for something, Made even funnier when I shared that I had woken up with a slight sense of dread like, “Damn, I have to dive today.” Because now that I had done it, I couldn’t let myself fall back into the fear of it. Like how when you haven’t been to an amusement park in a long time you get so nervous to ride the huge rollercoaster, but then you do it and you remember how exhilarating it is.

The reason I am writing about this is because 1) I am proud of myself for doing something I have never had the courage to do, and 2). To encourage someone else to do something that has always scared them but they’ve wanted to accomplish. It can be something as silly as learning how to dive as an adult, or maybe something way bigger. It felt good to have that anticipatory sort of scared feeling in my stomach, and it felt good to want to succeed in something new. Even though I may still have a slight trepidation about plunging my lanky six-foot body into the air and down smoothly into the water, I feel at this moment that when I put my mind to something, the only thing that could stop me from accomplishing it is my own fear holding me back.

To a long summer of diving into swimming pools, Isabella