Yesterday I completed my first ever bid for consultancy work (previous work has come through less formal methods!). Hope it works out....

Yesterday we braved the cold waters of Vobster quarry for our first two open water dives. I had expected to feel really cold, but although I could hardly move in three layers of wet suit, the trickle of 10 degree C water down my back quickly warmed.

It was more fun than I imagined. I had never thought of quarries as pretty places, but full of water and with a caravan selling burgers and tea they can be very attractive.

The training included compass work, coping with air running out (simulated not real), clearing a diving mask of water, and so on. The pay-off was swimming around with the trout and gazing at the wreck of an aeroplane!

See photos.

The last three days I've attended a course in Bristol (run by Business Link and hosted by Brave) for those starting a new business.

It has been a good opportunity to meet new people, to brush up on marketing and budgetting, and to have questions answered about tax-efficient business planning.

Attended a short course today, at Ivy House in Warminster, on running weeks of guided prayer. This was an opportunity to learn about a way of doing things that I had not encountered before (i.e. people experiencing accompaniment and extra prayer alongside the normal rhythm of their daily lives, instead of "going away on retreat") and to gather some resources.

Last night all four of us started our PADI^® Open Water Diver course, taught locally by The Divezone in Melksham (formerly Aqualeisure). We'll be learning in pools in Melksham, Bath, a disused quarry at Vobster, and hopefully the sea.

You may think that this is cold time of year to be diving in UK waters, but enthusiasts say, "What does it matter!?" The tuition is good here, and the timing is governed by Steph's extensive gap year timetable, leading up to some diving she will be doing in Mexico next year!

The course got off too a good and exciting start, although it does seem strange sitting on the bottom of a swimming pool, looking up at the surface, and breathing!

This week I enjoyed SIMA^TM training in Oxford with a group of new friends.

I have enjoyed being on the receiving end of this coaching and am now licensed to use the system, and in particular the Who do you think you are? programme in my own coaching work.

The probably unique method is not based on filling in a questionnaire that then describes a person as one of a number of categories (who does like to be just a number or to have to fit in a particular box?) Instead it draws out a person's motivated abilities - what they enjoy doing and are good at - through structured interviewing. This information is then fed back through conversations, or an ongoing coaching process, to develop self-understanding and good decisions to be made about career and life choices.

SIMA stands for System for Identifying Motivated Abilities and was developed by Arthur Miller in the early 1960's. It has been used extensively ever since in Europe as well as the USA.