How about a reg repair course?
What's next after "Master" Diver?
- Thread starter Dehydrated_Atom
- Start date
Please register or login
Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.
Benefits of registering include
- Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
- A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
- You can make this box go away
Take the specialties that you have aquired and do dives that will permit you the opportunity to expand upon them. In other words; now go out and really apply the theory to the real world. Combine more then one specialty where and when possible. As the magazines states good divers are always learning. Work with other divers who are just entering these specialty areas
Buoyant1
Contributor
DaleC
Contributor
That's all it takes?
Instead of asking others what courses they think you should take because you can't be bothered to do your own research why don't you decide just what it is you are lacking, or what area of diving really interests you. The answer to your question will flow from there. Then people can give you specific answers to specific courses. Currently, you are like a child wanting to be spoon fed pablum and complaining because you don't like the taste. Take some personal responsibility instead of blaming others.
OP
Dehydrated_Atom
Contributor
I have researched. This is a forum. I am here to discuss options, find out third party opinions. It is just another step in the research.
If you had read my posts, you would see what classes I am considering taking. I've mentioned them a few times.
Unfortunately you have disregarded those posts, and now formed a completely ridiculous analogy describing your wonderful opinion of me.
The internet is the great equalizer, and rather than speak to a person as you would in real life, you are given the opportunity to be snarky and disrespectful, ultimately resorting to insult.
Class act buddy.
OP
Dehydrated_Atom
Contributor
I'm highly considering this, but I'm not sure where I should put it in the priority list.
OP
Dehydrated_Atom
Contributor
I'm grateful for the helpful posts thus far, though I was disappointed to find only a few truly useful posts. The rest of the posts I just think, well, sure I'll go dive more, but I'll be back here at 500 dives asking whats next as far as education goes. Certainly I talk to the people locally who have been there done that. I only came here to find more opinions, as I have lurked scubaboard considerably and found some great advice.
Since none of us have seen you dive, it's hard to know what to say in terms of how you should aim to improve yourself.
The high current, relatively deep dives you have been doing are great experience for gas management and efficiency in the water, and the direct ascents are great for buoyancy practice, if you use them for that. How do you feel about your situational awareness and ability to respond to underwater problems?
I am a great fan of the GUE Fundamentals class for recreational divers, because I think it introduces people to a whole new standard of performance in diving, and also the concept of operating as a team in the water. And having just come home from an intense, three-day dive trip to the Channel Islands (which is NOT where I normally dive) with 20 other trained divers, I can again sing the praises of good training and good practice in fitting people for dives like our Farnsworth Banks dive, where the pinnacle began at 80 feet or so, in probably close to 2 knots of current (how much does it take to paralyze a scooter?) and limited viz. 20 divers went down, 20 divers had a great dive, and 20 divers made it back to the boat, with their buddies, without needing the chase skiff.
The one thing that worries and saddens me a bit about your posts is that I think I am hearing you saying that doing the dives you have been doing has palled on you, and you feel the need to push the envelope to get the thrill back. Getting more training and doing "bigger" dives is one way to do that, but so is taking up underwater photography, or getting into teaching, or starting to do Reef surveys, or anything else that changes the way you LOOK at the dives you are already doing. We all need to reinvigorate our diving experiences from time to time, and there are a lot of ways to do that.
The high current, relatively deep dives you have been doing are great experience for gas management and efficiency in the water, and the direct ascents are great for buoyancy practice, if you use them for that. How do you feel about your situational awareness and ability to respond to underwater problems?
I am a great fan of the GUE Fundamentals class for recreational divers, because I think it introduces people to a whole new standard of performance in diving, and also the concept of operating as a team in the water. And having just come home from an intense, three-day dive trip to the Channel Islands (which is NOT where I normally dive) with 20 other trained divers, I can again sing the praises of good training and good practice in fitting people for dives like our Farnsworth Banks dive, where the pinnacle began at 80 feet or so, in probably close to 2 knots of current (how much does it take to paralyze a scooter?) and limited viz. 20 divers went down, 20 divers had a great dive, and 20 divers made it back to the boat, with their buddies, without needing the chase skiff.
The one thing that worries and saddens me a bit about your posts is that I think I am hearing you saying that doing the dives you have been doing has palled on you, and you feel the need to push the envelope to get the thrill back. Getting more training and doing "bigger" dives is one way to do that, but so is taking up underwater photography, or getting into teaching, or starting to do Reef surveys, or anything else that changes the way you LOOK at the dives you are already doing. We all need to reinvigorate our diving experiences from time to time, and there are a lot of ways to do that.
DaleC
Contributor
The people I dive with, IRL, don't ask others for advice and then criticize the advice they are given. I didn't have a problem with your posts until #32 when you started that nonsense.
When I read this I see a diver who doesn't know which way they want to go with their diving. That's not a crime. I've been there myself, but the homework is yours, not ours. The answer is either: (a) take a shotgun approach to dive training, gobbling up random courses willy nilly or (b) do some more diving till you figure out what you want to do. There is no one course, or series of courses, that covers science diving, underwater archeology, zero vis diving, mixed gas diving, CCR diving... The closest might be going the GUE/UTD route as their community/training focus upon some of those subjects (well, maybe not CCR) but by the way you responded to Dan I suspect you already knew that. Which might kind of make the others responding to your thread feel they have just be wasting their time.
As for finding things to do that don't involve taking another course. Click on the Cultus Lake Project link in my sig line. There you will find a project that I am heading up that I anticipate will take several years to complete. I've probably logged about 50 - 75 dives in that one lake, have surveyed about 1/4 of its coastline, am collecting data on an endangered species, lias with DFO/community reps/other projects, have discovered unrecorded wreckage and will probably wind up creating a local diving guide by the time I'm finished - all with AOW.
When I read about other divers who can't seem to figure out what to do when diving without having a course or some other formal structure present I can't help but feel they may be experiencing one of two roadblocks. Either they are afraid to strike out on their own and make command like decisions regarding their diving or they lack the imagination to develop a course of action without validation from an external source ie: someone else telling them it's a good idea. Those are hurdles that we all must overcome from time to time and the only question is whether we attempt to overcome them and grow as divers or retreat from them and remain reliant upon someone else to make our decisions for us.
You really don't need to keep taking courses to grow as a diver, you just need to figure out what you want to do. Then the courses will take care of themselves.
When I read this I see a diver who doesn't know which way they want to go with their diving. That's not a crime. I've been there myself, but the homework is yours, not ours. The answer is either: (a) take a shotgun approach to dive training, gobbling up random courses willy nilly or (b) do some more diving till you figure out what you want to do. There is no one course, or series of courses, that covers science diving, underwater archeology, zero vis diving, mixed gas diving, CCR diving... The closest might be going the GUE/UTD route as their community/training focus upon some of those subjects (well, maybe not CCR) but by the way you responded to Dan I suspect you already knew that. Which might kind of make the others responding to your thread feel they have just be wasting their time.
Hello SB.
So at one point I told myself:
"Self, go ahead and get 4 specialties that are relevant to your primary local for diving, then go ahead and get a CPR & First Aid cert and the Stress & Rescue course knocked out, but that's all the dang money you need to give up."
That's taken me through "Master" Diver. Well, I'm certainly no master.
I don't really do any overhead diving, though I might like to penetrate a wreck someday. Woe was me when, after taking the SSI Wreck Diving Specialty, they were like "Congrats, you may or may not see wrecks underwater, this course is designed to tell you that, and don't go inside them."
I feel like I should take Science of Diving, though I have no desire to become a Dive Master/Con or Instructor.
I feel like I should take some kind of Zero Vis course, because frankly, I've thought about what I would do if I couldn't see, and I can't come up with any guaranteed ways of free ascending safely.
I have the Nitrox course taken care of, but I feel like I should at least get familiar with other mixes, as well as closed circuit diving and any other prudent technical diving courses (recommendations/explanations would be awesome), though I have no desire to become a commercial diver.
I wouldn't mind getting an AAUS or some Scientific Diver certification that would allow me to volunteer for surveys and species collection etc.
My quick breakdown:
Specialties: Nitrox, AOW (Underwater Nav, Night/Limited Vis, Deep Diving, Wreck Diving), MD (Stress & Rescue, CPR & First Aid). A number of dives over 100' up to 116'. Over 100 dives. Though I've stopped logging them because "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn". I'm not in it for the pissing contests or the prestige, I'm in it to be a better diver compared only to myself and to enjoy and maybe help the oceans.
If you've made it this far, Cheers!Now please tell me your secrets.
As for finding things to do that don't involve taking another course. Click on the Cultus Lake Project link in my sig line. There you will find a project that I am heading up that I anticipate will take several years to complete. I've probably logged about 50 - 75 dives in that one lake, have surveyed about 1/4 of its coastline, am collecting data on an endangered species, lias with DFO/community reps/other projects, have discovered unrecorded wreckage and will probably wind up creating a local diving guide by the time I'm finished - all with AOW.
When I read about other divers who can't seem to figure out what to do when diving without having a course or some other formal structure present I can't help but feel they may be experiencing one of two roadblocks. Either they are afraid to strike out on their own and make command like decisions regarding their diving or they lack the imagination to develop a course of action without validation from an external source ie: someone else telling them it's a good idea. Those are hurdles that we all must overcome from time to time and the only question is whether we attempt to overcome them and grow as divers or retreat from them and remain reliant upon someone else to make our decisions for us.
You really don't need to keep taking courses to grow as a diver, you just need to figure out what you want to do. Then the courses will take care of themselves.
Last edited:
OP
Dehydrated_Atom
Contributor
The rest of your post was fantastic, though I've quoted a specially relevant part.
This is just how I am with everything I do. Adrenaline rocks my world. I recently started spearfishing, which is pretty exciting. Though the only part I feel makes me a better diver is practicing getting the fish off the spear, onto the stringer, and reloading all while maintaining the same depth. It was something I didn't realize I needed work on until I got my first fish, got all excited and bouyancy control went out the door.
Similar threads
