A wet January

Ah wow, just how fast does time go? I felt that I only blinked since my last blog and ended up here! January went by in a whirlwind, literally. Cyclone Berguitta, heavy rains and flash floods battered Mauritius relentlessly. I love rain and storms (my name actually means rain in Hindi!) but I found the weather quite oppressive.

So, how are you all doing on your New Year Resolutions?

I didn't have any, except for the intention to heal, to shake myself up, and live the highest version of my life that I could. This January, I started with diving. Pushing myself to dive every time I had a free moment, I began exploring the underwater treasures that Mauritius had to offer. I went for deeper and deeper dives and with each dive, I began feeling more confident.

^ Dancing at Silverstar

Every time there was a hiccup (and knowing my luck there were a LOT) I grew calmer as I learnt to handle it, like a boss. Being stared at by fish no longer unsettled me.

Today, we went to Coin de Mire, which offers some of Mauritius's best dive sites and where I was dying to go since ages. Our first dive was on the Djabeda wreck, a dainty little fishing vessel that had been sunk to create an artificial reef at a depth of about 30 metres. Djabeda teemed with life; colourful fish flitted among the corals which had grown on its deck. It was gorgeous, magical.

I wish I had taken better pictures but... I had a major hiccup. My jacket started inflating - which means I started going up like a balloon. At a 30 metres depth, going up like a rocket would have meant decompression sickness (and other bad things).

F**k. 

I held on to the wreck, purged the air, was dragged down by the divemasters, and enjoyed the wreck for a grand total of ten minutes. Oh well. 

This dive helped me see how I focused on the negatives. I inflated them till they consumed me: like my jacket, I saw how easy it was to spin out of control (when it was but a simple glitch), as I ignored the RANGE of positives - and I'm sure I'm not the only one who does this.

I was beating myself up for not being able to execute the dive as flawlessly as the others, even though the equipment hiccup wasn't something I could control. Instead of focusing on the fact that I'd come a long way from those days where I would panic and even refuse to roll over into the water from the boat, or how I'd successfully managed to survive this situation calmly, I focused on imaginary or real setbacks.

Each dive teaches me something new, and this one taught me this:

 ^ Today's dive was teeming with schools of fish.

^ I was about to type 'not my best look' ... and it would underscore my point about focusing on the negatives.

1. What if we chose to obsess over the things we get right rather than the things we get wrong?

2. The healing journey lies in stillness: it takes effort to sink lower and lower into our own consciousness, but it is still doable, and there are huge treasures to be found - diving turned out to be an excellent metaphor for this.

3. Confidence is like a muscle, it needs to be exercised and only becomes stronger slowly, over time. It is the little victories that matter: the hiccups that you successfully deal with, the little caverns that you swim in despite your claustrophobia, graciously receiving the compliments from the divers and divemasters that you seem comfortable under water - it is these that you need to internalise, accept and use to stretch your confidence muscle, and it takes time and effort to build the habit of being confident.