Are you watching someone mermaid and think to yourself "That is soooo lame"? Yeah, me too. I've been a passionate freediver for a few years now, and then I watched "Merpeople" on Netflix. (If you haven't, please do). It was hilarious in the sense that I laughed AT them, not with them.
I was in Bali in 2023 where my husband worked as a freediving instructor. We had a common friend who worked at Bali Mermaid School as an instructor there. My husband proposed that I do the PADI Mermaid instructor course with her, and I just laughed at the idea. I had been searching for a way to develop my freediving outside of the standard apnea sphere, so the laughter eventually turned into "why not".
I still thought mermaids were a bit lame, and cringed at the whole pink girly idea of mermaiding. But I decided to do the instructor course as a challenge and a creative pursuit to enchance my freediving.
Turns out, mermaiding IS challenging, and an amazing way of finding and honouring your creative expression. And from laughing at the "Merpeople", I gained a huge amount of respect for their art, resilience and vulnerability. And the truth is, being a mermaid doesn't have to involve pink, sparkly and bubbly. It certainly can! But you can also be dark, mysterious, sensual, weird, or ANYTHING you want to be. It truly is YOUR unique expression of yourself. You can be a mermaid, merman, merperson, mercat, mer-stick insect, the ocean is the limit!
So if you still think mermaids are lame, try it out, even if it's ironic. And maybe you'll discover something about yourself. I challenge you!