I had wanted to try scuba diving since I was 14 years old. But growing up, none of my friends or family shared the same interest, so for years it remained something I kept telling myself I would do “one day.”
That “one day” eventually came during a difficult period of my life.
Around 2014, I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety. As part of managing what I was going through, my doctor encouraged me to get away from the negative environment surrounding me, travel and find activities that could help redirect my attention and engage with life beyond the problems I was facing.
So I finally did something I had wanted to do since I was a teenager. I travelled alone to Tioman Island and took my Open Water diving course.
I didn’t expect that decision to become such an important turning point in my life.
Finding Focus Beneath the Surface
Entering the underwater world gave me something completely new to look forward to. Beneath the surface, my attention shifted to simple things: my breathing, my buoyancy, my surroundings, my buddy and what was happening at that exact moment.
There was a sense of peace there that I struggled to find elsewhere.
Over time, alongside the medical care I was receiving, my health and overall wellbeing improved. Less than a year after becoming certified, my doctor was able to discontinue the medication I had been prescribed for depression.
I do not see scuba diving as a medical treatment or a cure. It was simply one meaningful part of my own journey towards feeling healthier and moving forward.
Diving also changed the way I looked at life above the surface. Entering what felt like an entirely new world lifted my spirit and gave me something positive to pursue.
The lessons I learned underwater, to breathe, stay calm, trust my buddy, understand my limits and deal with what was in front of me, began influencing how I navigated my life on the surface as well.
Even today, I don’t need a new or spectacular dive site to enjoy diving. I can return to the same place and still be happy to descend. Conditions change, marine life changes, visibility changes, and I change. No two dives ever feel exactly the same.
But somewhere along the way, diving became more than something I did for myself.
Discovering Adaptive Diving
Through Diveheart Malaysia, I was introduced to adaptive scuba diving and the opportunity to support divers with disabilities. This opened an entirely different chapter in my diving journey.
I am especially grateful to Tuan Syed Abd Rahman, who brought me into the Diveheart Malaysia community and introduced me to the world of adaptive scuba diving.
His encouragement and willingness to share his experience gave me an opportunity to see diving from a completely different perspective.
I began to understand that the underwater world can also be a place where people are given opportunities rather than being defined by their physical limitations.
Adaptive diving requires patience, teamwork, trust, creativity and an understanding that every diver may need a different kind of support.
Sometimes that support is physical. Sometimes it is simply being there, listening, encouraging and helping someone believe they can try something they once thought was beyond their reach.
A Two-Way Journey
Becoming involved as a volunteer has also changed me.
I initially thought I would be helping others. But I gradually realised that volunteering can be a two-way journey.
By helping adaptive divers, I am also challenging myself to become more patient, more aware, more physically involved and more emotionally present. It has given me another reason to get into the water and another way to keep learning.
In a way, they help me as much as I hope I can help them.
There is something deeply meaningful about watching someone with a disability discover confidence underwater, work through a challenge, or simply experience the freedom of being in an environment where their disability does not have to define the entire experience.
It has reminded me that accessibility is not only about making space for people to participate. Sometimes it is about creating opportunities for people to discover what they are capable of.
And perhaps that is another reason why I continue to descend.
Diving once helped me rediscover myself.
Now, through adaptive diving and volunteering, I have the opportunity to help someone else discover a part of themselves.
Why I Descend
For me, diving has become connected to larger themes of fear, breathing, pressure, confidence, finding something that gives us purpose, supporting others and learning how to keep moving forward.
So why do I descend?
Not to run away from life above the surface, but because of what being beneath it has taught me about returning to that life.
And now, perhaps, because descending has given me the opportunity to help others find their own way forward too.
“The ocean didn’t remove my problems. It taught me a different way to face them. So, I descend.”
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