Decades of research have found a correlation between positive thinking and happiness, better health, reduced stress, resilience, overcoming personal challenges and longer lifespans. In business, optimism is correlated with increased productivity, higher motivation, greater engagement and teamwork, enhanced solution creation and stronger resilience. Addressing ocean threats and various life challenges are less stressful with a positive mindset.
How do you develop a positive mindset? It varies with each of us depending upon age, surroundings and where we source our information. Many of us draw inspiration from the positive people we interact with personally or indirectly. Many people tend to do this through social media channels and influencers, whereas others – particularly GenX and Baby Boomers – may connect more through podcasts, blogs and traditional media, like books and magazines.
A positive mindset enables us to see beyond problems and take action, motivating us to reframe our thinking. Consider the Ocean with David Attenborough documentary, in which Attenborough shows us the ocean’s beauty and importance, then inspires us with the positive premise that challenges threatening the oceans are urgent but solvable. When PADI AWARE asked for diver support to get threatened sharks and rays added to the CITES protection list via multiple dive community channels, they received more than 135,000 signatures and over 245,000 letters from Ocean Torchbearers of all ages and cultures acting positively to get them listed. Diveheart, First Step Foundation, PADI Diver Cody Unser, Patriot Scuba and hundreds of other Adaptive Techniques divers and instructors use diving’s healing “superpower” to transform lives. During the pandemic, positive-mindset dive operators around the world refused failure, pivoted, replanned and refocused their businesses in dozens of ways so they survived and, in many cases, even thrived by creating new local markets.
There are literally thousands of dive community examples like these that can inspire us, but ultimately, positivity is a choice. We choose the factors around us – positive or negative – that we let influence us. Faced with challenges, we choose how we frame them mentally. We also choose – in person, emails, blogs, social media and so on – whether we influence others positively or negatively while diving, teaching or conducting business. Do we accept a constant stream of negativity, or do we limit it to a trickle? When we face something negative, do we react with apathy, outrage, anger and hopelessness, or solution-thinking and action? Do we swim in acrimony and rancor about those we don’t agree with, or do we hold up and praise those who exemplify our values?
These aren’t minor points. A positive mental outlook followed by action, by even one person, is contagious and can transform a business or industry. It can translate into a movement and change the world. Consider what it can do for the ocean, the dive industry and those who need diving’s healing power, which really means all of us.
I’ve grown more self-reflective and pay attention to how I frame things mentally. Remember to first look at “the person in the mirror.” What you let influence you links to how you may be influencing others. What others see in you, and you in yourself, is important. Do you want to be someone who sees the good, faces challenges with tenacity and positivity, believes that you can make a difference and then acts on that belief? If so, then we have this in common. There’s a lot of good and progress out there to believe in, and it begins with each of us making a choice.
Sincerely,
Drew Richardson
President & CEO
PS: As trusted Ocean Torchbearer leaders, we can put our positivity power into action securing protections for threatened whale sharks, oceanic whitetips and manta rays. Visit the Conservation Action Portal from 1-21 November, 2025 and sign the business letter to the UN 2025 CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species), encouraging the convention to protect these threatened species. Your dive business and staff member voices can directly influence policy outcomes; please take a few minutes to do this.
