THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS ... UNDER WATER [SCUBA]

Scanning around social media is enough to find many "recipes" to achieve happiness. I have seen more frequently with those who talk about meditation and how making it a habit can change your life and perception of happiness.

But after reading few articles about meditation I always have that strange question: what is meditating? Many people say that meditating will bring you happiness and satisfaction and many other benefits, but in reality nobody tells you how to meditate.

Trying to get more to the bottom of the topic I tried to go to yoga lessons, it should be mentioned that at least in this part of the planet (Playa del Carmen, Mexico) yoga has been marketed more as a "sport to brag socially that one is more spiritual and healthy ".

Wanting to be a good student, I ask my teacher:

• What is real meditation and how can I achieve it?

His response left me confused a bit more:

• Is to focus your attention on an spot within.

Then closed his eyes and started breathing so strange that I thought that if I interrupted him with another of my doubts on the subject something catastrophic would happen.

But my inner child who longed to begin the search for happiness kept drilling me:

• What do you mean with a spot within?

• Is it perhaps in the guts?

Or in the throat? Or more interior, as well as the bone marrow? And this is how my search for happiness through meditation came to an end.

In this sense and after (ironically) meditating more on the subject, I began to gather several concepts and experiences with Scuba Diving, in this way and from my personal point of view Scuba Diving has given me greater results than the meditation since practiced with constancy and continuity, it becomes an activity that generates a mental state of leisure.

I would like to make a brief clarification on the concept of leisure (which could be discussed very extensively) and for these purposes, I would like to refer to some leisure elements that WLO gives us (World Leisure Organization, Before WRLA)

• Human experience with its own benefits such as freedom of choice, creativity, satisfaction, enjoyment and pleasure.

• Personal and social development.

• Important aspect of quality of life.

• Promote a well-being and general state of good health.

• Alleviate social problems such as dissatisfaction, stress, boredom and alienation.

That's why my recipe for happiness includes a good amount of diving as a leisure activity because:

• It has benefits on good humor, negative thoughts disappear and many positive feelings appear.

• Improves mental health because it reduces stress and offers an alternative to the daily hostility of a hectic life.

• It makes us face challenges that set in motion our cognitive and motor skills.

• It gives us a great sense of freedom and opens our mind to wonderful worlds.

• Increases social integration and cooperation.

• It gives us a sense of acceptance and belonging.

• It helps us to re-create ourselves and increase our sense of fulfillment.

But above all it helps to generate an immense feeling of GRATITUDE

and AWARENESS.

The search for happiness is so subjective that there are as many forms of happiness as there are people in the world, there are those who seek it in work, in material goods, in knowledge, in spiritual development, in professional development, in family life, etc.

In the end I think it is a balance between many factors and in my personal case I found the gratest factor in Scuba Diving.

And you? If you are already a diver I invite you to write in the comments how diving has generated happiness and if you have not yet practiced diving you could tell me about the obstacles that have prevented you from diving.