- The nonprofit Life Worth Leading provides recreational and educational opportunities to people of all abilities.
- One activity is scuba diving.
- Watch the video to see how they use scuba diving to create a community here.
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
Ronny Ahmed was introduced to scuba diving ten years ago when he met a woman named Gabrielle Gabrielli in the ICU.
“After I was shot and paralyzed at a school shooting so she knew I was a Boy Scout and Eagle Scout, loved the outdoors and animals so she said have you ever been scuba diving”
Ahmed was shot during the tragic Strozier-Library shooting at Florida State University back in 2014.
He joined Gabrielle’s nonprofit, Life Worth Leading. It provides recreational and educational opportunities to people of all abilities.
This led to Ahmed becoming the highest-ranking diver with paraplegia in the Scuba Educators International and Divers Alert Network. Now he’s an instructor with the network.
Scuba diving became a positive light for him after experiencing a traumatic event.
“It’s hard to imagine what I would be doing as far as a career job goes, so this was incredible for so many reasons.”
Now he and others help those who have experienced similar situations.
Walt Kreitlow is one of them. After falling in love with scuba diving, he also became an instructor.
“I’m just passionate about it and it’s good to see when you have a new scuba diver and they really get to 60 or 70 feet and they can feel it and they’re instantly hooked.”
The group volunteers in the community, providing education through recreational activities like scuba diving.
Some groups they have helped include veterans, people with disabilities, animal rescues, and under-served populations.
Ahmed says opportunities like this are hard to come by and it’s changed his life.
“To be able to sit there and help build someone back up in the way that people have done for me and I can’t imagine something more important to do with my life.”
