yoga/meditation and freediving

[Fondueset]

We tend to view these sorts of things in terms of 'control' - but control is generally synonomous with 'repression' in our vocabulary. Of course sometimes it's all ya got - but it's important not to define spiritual work purely in terms of personal will.

For Pranayam in freediving we are really lucky to have people on this board who've done a good amount of actual practice and checked out the results. Hard to do better than that for help!

<edited for fluff>

 

[Fondueset]

rofl

teach me to get pedantic

Good luck with that whole 'negative impulse' thing - by the way.

 

[bluh2o]

Ouch. This narrow band of communication (words only) seems to be failing me.

Mr. Fondue , I want you to know that I happily anticipate your posts because they are challenging for me to grasp and when I say it takes me a while to digest I'm not kidding. Blame it on the California State school system of the sixties and seventies, or just accept that my brain is permanently bathed in a pedantic fog. I am essentially a California Surf rat who has waded into an intellectuall pond which may be over my head.

I just re-read my post and I sound like a smart ass. How do I come up with this stuff? It's not hypoxia because I haven't been training.

Apologies if I offended.

Particularly in my poor placement and choice of words with my "heart felt thought" comment. It was crass. You made a very clear statement, I drove over it and you edited it. I regret that.

My bit about following your line of thought using a dive as an example was sincere. When you're on the bottom and want to breath do you let the impulse pass? On good dives I do and it gives a little more bottom time.

 

[Fondueset]

Thanks - but it looked verbose and puffy to me I appreciate your comments. No offense. I've been cranky ever since I discovered 3C water makes me nauseous. I step outside and glare at the sun each morning 'so..you're s'posed ta be all freakin' warm..right?'

I haven't really been pushing the envelope diving - though I do pretty much allways push past that first impulse I'm generally probably only down there about half as long as I could be. Usually diving with my daughter Maybe when her rescue skills are up to speed.

 

[bluh2o]

No offense taken. I'll follow your lead and try to take better aim. 3c? Yikes, Please feel free to call on us on Kauai this summer. My 16 year old daughter likes to dive too although it's not one of her priorities. (one can only hope) I was encouraged a couple of years ago when I gave her my wieght belt. She put it on and dropped down. When she came up she was excited. I thought it might be because of the clear water, the fish, but she said "you can stay under for ever with that thing!"

To try to get back to Thread here, I've got a dream which would be more appropriate for you guys up in the northerly Latitudes. I envision a backyard swimming pool, heated, twelve to fifteen feet in diameter and 30 to 90 feet deep. Out here on the edge of the empire where many loosely teathered people seem to end up we could turn it into a new Yoga/meditation/Marine mammalian modality. "reconnect with your inner dolphin" A hundred dollars an hour would offset the costs a little. visiting Guru's (you guys) could get their trips paid for by booking a seminar in advance. Unfortunately my wife, a well grounded Buckeye by the way, hasn't warmed up to the idea but I've only been working on her for a couple of years.

 

[Fondueset]

One of my 'modified' fantasies - a personal quarry in the backyard - exactly as described. I've got a good acre back there so we could make it wider.

My daughter is 17 and LOVES freediving. She was out with me last weekend in the 3mm elios suit I got her for summer - 38F water for like 45 minutes! She said she was no colder than one of our normal cold day dives (we've been doing early june through begining october without suits). We bought summer suits from Eliossub. Off-the-shelf models with thermic plush lining and separate hoods - they took all our measurements however and the suits fit perfectly. I think the line between custom and pre-made with them is probably often overridden by perfectionsim. Closest I've been to hawaii is Catalina Island. For sure we'll take you up on the invite if we get over there! I have a friend on maui who periodically sends me pictures of invisible water.

My original life plan was to live in a cave on the coast of Baja - with some gear, a speargun and a kayak - just do yoga and live off fish and kelp. Apparently I didn't think it was 'realistic' <insane laughter>

 

[bluh2o]

That's a thought, I could sell the dirt in my backyard and get paid to put in a dive pool. You actually have a quarry in your backyard? Those Elios suits must be pretty efficient. I can't imagine 3mm in cold water. I use 3mm here where the water is ahh.. mid seventies? God I'm weak.

Baja,ha,ha, Yes, I'll meet you there only my "cave" will be an old 30' sloop, just sail and rudder, forget the GPS, the VHS, the lifeboat. I sailed there last spring with this old man. He was 84, shunned the aforementioned safety devices, slept on deck for two weeks, shaved with wd-40 instead of soap, ate canned spam and canned yams and put me to shame with his endurance. I asked if I could be his disciple but he wouldn't have me.

 

[bluh2o]

Here's a little dive story, kind of diving/meditation fusion. It was on the last dive during a few days of Freediving off the shores of Hawaii. My buddies were tired and drinking so I pulled on my long fins, mask and snorkel and kicked out over the sunny shallows of a Marine reserve called Puako. A hundred yards from shore the rolling slope of coral fell off quickly into a dark blue Pacific. I hung on the surface and began calming down. I bobbed and dropped down on a few preliminary dives. The edge where the slope dropped into hundreds of feet started at abouty sixty.

Next I began dropping to that sixty foot edge. Although I didn’t have my spear that day I acted as if I was hunting. It’s a meditation. Lying on the bottom, still as can be, waiting. Nothing moves, not even the eyeballs. Just waiting, looking at everything but nothing in particular and allowing for the opportunity of a big fish to swim up close. I repeated this kind of dive for about a half hour. It was at this point, about 40 minutes in the water, that I could go my deepest and stay the longest before starting to feel blown out. Coincidentally boredom began to set in too. So I called off my tired old hunter mindset and began to play.

I thought I’d just drift to the bottom like a leaf off a tree, kind of horizontal and gradual, like a dead man. I dunked under and let gravity take care of the descent. I had a little extra lead on my belt because I'd been spear fishing earlier. Out in front of me nothing but beautiful blue water, Gods-eyes of sunlight sparkling down and down. No sound, no discernable temperature variation, no current. Pure quiet, pure relaxation and a totally empty head. Slowly falling through a liquid atmosphere. Then, only a few seconds into the drift something happened. First it was just another tranquil moment in the ocean and then, as if a switch was flipped, I felt invisible. I had the sensation that behind what I was seeing was just more ocean, no legs, no body, no fins, no mask, “I” was gone. There was nothing of me there, just the big blue ocean. It felt unreal, amazing, like I was the invisible man. Looking back I remember not seeing my nose or mask, nothing.

The drift to the bottom was slow but unfortunately destined to end. I set down gently onto a coral head and returned to my body so to speak. A large fish grew out of the distant dark blue as I lay there trying to process what had just happened. It was a Hammerhead shark. Thinking back it’s still like a dream. She approached me directly in a long curving glide, about thirteen feet long and probably upwards of six or seven hundred pounds. Just one huge shark and endless blue water. Since I was out of air by then I gave a gentle kick and began to surface. As I was rising she curved directly under me and began following the multi colored rolling coral slopes. I surfaced and tagged along behind as long as I could before she disappeared.

 

[icarus pacific]

That's a beaut.

Aww, now there you go. smooooth.

 

[Tahoe Diver]

bluh2o -

That was a great dive story. I won't be in the ocean until next month so I'll read your post every now and again so I won't go crazy behind my desk!

For me, the feeling you decribed is the ideal. No matter how hard I've tried, I just can't feel that way with SCUBA.

 

[Fondueset]

very nice

 

[bluh2o]

Thanks! That was a story from a while ago but it was true and smacked of a meditative experience. I'm going to try to get on with a fictional story I had going here three years ago under "kbakery". I invite you'all to check it out. [ame="http://forums.deeperblue.net/showthread.php?t=25532"]Big Island Story[/ame]

TP

 

[bluh2o]

Mr. Fondue, Going back a few posts. (I hope your spring weather has sprung by the way. My better half was just in Columbus and had some great Mid-western days with one blizzard thrown in.) Was thinking about the idea of letting negative impulses pass as opposed to doing something about them. What do you do when you're on the bottom and that first impulse to breath comes? Resist, deny, sublimate, wait 'til it passes?

Really just looking to keep this thread awake. It's almost time to dive again but another late swell just came through and added a few more days to the surfing season. Leaving tomorrow for eight sessions of Ashtanga with Da Guru in SF. I'll be sublimating the desire to eat lots of Crab and drink fine imported Tequila's. So as not to waste my yoga fees. Hmm.... I'm torn already.

 

[gurmeet]

According to me, yoga can totally change your life in a positive way. You can also visit the given site for more information on Yoga. The website will help you to understand the difference between the most popular types of Yoga and their timings so you can choose which type is right for you.
Yoga becomes part of your physical life.
Yoga becomes part of your mental life.
Yoga becomes part of your spiritual life.

 

[Hadouken]

Bluh2o

I would really recommend you to do some lung stretching and breathing exercises to make your body stronger. Search about Pranayama Qi Gong; it works wonders and I think it will be useful for Diving and health in general.


Hadouken
Meditation Teacher

 

[Fondueset]

Worth noting the dates on the posts - Bluh20s last post was more than 5 years ago.

 

[Jo_duiker]

Yes, 8:32:16 = inhale for 8 seconds, hold for 32 seconds, exhale for 16 seconds. It is important to know that during inhalation and exhalation, the diaphragm must do the work. If you use the mouth or throat to 'pinch' the air flow (thus regulating the speed), then you will derive little or no benefit from the exercise.

As an example of this, if you hold your breath until you get contractions, and then begin a very slow exhale, using the diaphragm as the controller of flow, then you will never get any contractions during the exhale, no matter if you were getting contractions once per second during the hold.

On the other hand, if you pinch the airflow with your throat or mouth, and then do the same slow exhale, you'll get contractions during the exhale (an indicator of incorrect technique).

HOW on earth does one control an exhale (getting the exhale slower) with only the diaphragm?!!!