TESTIMONIALS

From my earliest days and until recently I grew up with a deep fear of the ocean and never really learned how either to be comfortable in the ocean or to swim in strongly and surely.

In 1999, I bought a condominium on the island of Maui (my dad's birthplace) and six weeks later I was fortunate enough to run into an old acquaintance in a market who told me of his great trip with a local kayaker by the name of Paul Doty. That very day I called and retained Paul to take me and my Hanai family - (amounting almost to my son and 9 year old granddaughter, Megan) out that next Sunday morning.

During our telephone prep interview, I found out that Paul knew me from my work in California and that in fact he and I had once met briefly. I advised him that I was not a good swimmer and he immediately responded, "That's Okay, you won't have to worry, I'll take good care of you". And he did! Our kayaking trip (including snorkeling) was a total success, with Paul equipping me with a life jacket and watching me closely, so I felt entirely safe.  As we concluded our trip, either I asked or he offered to give me swimming lessons and we agreed to undertake that.

Over the period of the next several months, just about each time I got myself to Maui, Paul Doty met me at the beach across from my condominium and gave me lessons for addressing the ocean and my fears and developing my capacities to take safe care of myself in the ocean, including swimming lessons.

I was fortunate to have my mother still alive then at the age of 94 and I told her that I was taking swimming lessons. She was pleased to hear that, saying I almost drowned in my sister's pool and I was so traumatized I couldn't drink water for a month!  That was the first time I had heard of that and I recognized that it both explained her terror of water and swimming and my own deeply and early on installed fear of swimming and the water.

So between Paul's caring and careful competent instruction and my own liberating myself by learning the roots of my malady, I have proceeded to grow comfortable in the water (including the ocean) and I have kept on taking swimming lessons after Paul's departure from Maui for Australia. 

Thanks Paul Doty, I am well on my way to becoming a strong, competent, confident, safe swimmer in the ocean.

John Vasconcellos (going on 76) 
California State Senator (retired)
38 years representing The Heart of Silicon Valley
Co-Founder of 'The Politics of Trust'