THE NATURAL HEALING AFFECTS OF WATER
The natural healing affects of water have been used by people around the world for its health benefits and therapeutic qualities.
Is it a drug without a prescription?
Water has been known to do many things in improving ones health:
- Weight loss, by boosting metabolism it also helps to make you feel full, curbing appetite.
- Increased energy; if you feel thirsty drink some water. Thirst is your body telling you you’re dehydrated. Water helps your blood transport oxygen and other essential nutrients to your cells.
- Reduce stress and cure a headache, nearly 80% of your brain tissue is… you guessed it… water. Dehydration causes stress. As my wife always says “I’m not asking you to donate a kidney, I’m asking you to drink a glass of water.”
- Endurance, water lubricates joints and helps prevent cramping. When you are hydrated you have greater strength and can endure longer physical and mental exercise.
- Healthier younger looking skin, water washes out the impurity’s in your body and skin and helps plump up your skin keeping that youthful look. Imagine a dry lake bed, do you want your face to look like that? Of course not, have another drink!
- Digestion – Does it hurt when you poop? Are you spending longer hours than usual at the dump station? Well my friend, you need to drink more water! Water helps dissolve waste particles allowing them to pass smoothly through your digestive track.
- Ouch! Kidney stones – Water dilutes salts and minerals in your urine helping reduce the risk of tiny little kidney stones that feel like boulders with sharp edges passing through your system.
The mystery of its healing power
We are beginning to learn that our brains are hardwired to react positively to water and that being near it can calm and connect us, increase innovation and insight, and even heal what’s broken.
Author of Blue Mind: The Surprising Science That Shows How Being Near, In, On, or Under Water Can Make You Happier, Healthier, More Connected, and Better at What You Do.
Wallace J. Nichols
The Natural Healing Affects of Water Through SCUBA
Think about it… we all were born to SCUBA
A child lives in the mothers womb for a period of approximately 9 months incapsulated in amniotic fluid breathing off an umbilical cord.
The umbilical cord is the main source of oxygen for the fetus. As long as the umbilical cord remains intact, there should be no risk of drowning in the womb.
Not much has changed in SCUBA. As long as we have our regulator in our mouth and plenty of gas, we’re good to go!
SCUBA Programs for veterans
Back in 2013 I was blessed to be a part of a small group of men and founder Steve Rubin, who started a program to help disabled veterans.
This organization would soon become what is called the WAVES PROJECT – (Wounded American Veterans Experience SCUBA).
The WAVES Project was established to help wounded American veterans experience the freedom and challenge of SCUBA Diving.
The natural healing affects of water and its unique properties are ideal in rehabilitation from various injuries, such as amputations, spinal cord injuries, PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injuries, along with many other injuries.
The properties of water give us the ability to experience many therapeutic benefits:
- Weightlessness – Taking away the pain we may feel from gravity that is placed on our bodies.
- Silence – Underwater, you can hear the soothing sound of your breath as you inhale and exhale from your regulator as bubbles effortlessly float to the surface.
- Serenity – Experience the calm, peaceful, ebb and flow of the environment around you.
- Discovery – Enter the unknown and witness creatures that look entirely alien to our land based brains.
Recover – Discover – Rebuild
SCUBA Diving is a buddy sport and having a friend or loved one dive with you not only heightens the experience, but it becomes more likely that you will continue diving, continue the therapy and enjoy the benefits it brings.
If you or a veteran you know has a rating of even 0%, this program is FREE for the veteran and a buddy Click Here to Fill Out Application
The Greatest Gift!
Since inception till now, I have been blessed with my own personal healing from SCUBA along with witnessing some miracles of others.
One of my favorite and most memorable moment with the WAVES Project was with Vietnam Veternan Ceasar Ramirez.
After his first open water dive at Catalina Island there was something unmistakingly different about this veteran.
My wife Rikki asked “Well Ceasar how do you feel?” His reply “Alive!” We all became very emotional at this point.
But what happens next would become a great learning experience for all of us.
Ceasar went on to explain how he was able to take in full breaths while diving.
He explained, this is something he hasn’t been able to to while sitting in his chair.
Being paralyzed form the chest down, his diaphragm is always compressed from the weight of his upper body.
In the water he is free to move without the gravity restricting him.
Watching him swim through the water, pulling himself with his webbed gloves took away his disability of being confined to a chair.
Ceasar was now an able body diver like everyone else.
ABC 7 Los Angeles – Waves Project gives wounded vets a chance to move pain-free as certified divers
Mission Oriented Diving
Working with the NPSR, National Parks Submerged Resource Center, has taken my skill set as diver to a whole new level.
This opportunity brings a high caliber of mentorship from a small group of elite dive professionals.
Working along side these amazing men and women have improved my critical thinking knowledge and safe diving practices.
As a veteran, being able to to perform mission oriented diving makes me feel normal again. It gives me the ability to work in small units developing trust in your buddy teams.
These buddy teams work out dive plans and specific tasks to gather needed data for a bigger objective. All buddy teams work collectively to complete overall project as a unit.
SCUBA HABITS
One of the crucial practices we have adopted as an organization and each individually is a simple brief after each dive.
- What did I do well?
- What could I have done better?
- What did we do well as a team?
- What can we improve on?
After a few consecutive days this skill becomes a habit. Subtly your dive planning improves, you find yourself becoming more aware during your next dive always improving.
This is only one of many gold nuggets I received. The take home I have gained observing these safe diving practices has established a mindset in self improvement, slowing down to speed up and finding joy in my work.
Working with the NPSR challenges my abilities and strengthens my desire to achieve greater purpose in all areas of my life.
Natural Healing Affects Of Water Through SCUBA
SCUBA diving has allowed me the opportunity to express my inner self that not many people know about me. I’m a bit of an introvert and prefer to be alone.
SCUBA diving brings me great joy! It relaxes me and has allowed me to let my hair down and interact with others above the surface.
It has helped me overcome alcoholism which was an antidote to covering up the past or just a means of escape.
When I’m diving, I’m in a state of being in the present moment. Nothing else matters.
It’s like being a super hero exploring an unknown planet, flying over amazing landscapes, penetrating sunken wrecks and caves amongst beautiful alien creatures that are just as curious about us as we are about them.
The WAVES Project has given me the ability to give back. Through the continuing education program, I have progressed as an advanced open water diver to Assistant Instructor.
As a Staff member I get to work with other student veterans and help them find the joy I get from SCUBA.
The paycheck at the end of the day is the smile you receive, the trust you have gained and the camaraderie you’ve embraced.
Dive-abled: The Leo Morales Story
I can’t end this blog without sharing a video and book by my good friend Leo Morales.
This story is a must read about a man who not only overcame his adversities physically and mentally; but now helps many others overcome their disabilities through the natural healing affects of water and SCUBA.
Enjoy the video below – Dive-abled: The Leo Morales Story.
Check out the book Dive-abled: The Leo Morales Story By Eric Douglas.
This incredible book expresses Leo’s inspirational and motivational story transforming lives by opening the doorway to an underwater world below the surface.
