These inspiring scuba diving quotes take your love of the ocean and marine life and put the indescribable into words to live by!
You ever try to explain your love of the ocean or scuba diving to someone that doesn’t scuba dive or see the ocean the same way? Here is a selection of my favorite scuba diving quotes, ocean quotes, conservation quotes, and quotes about sharks!
Some are from famous ocean conservationists, some authors, movie producers, actors, and some anonymous. No matter who said them, you’ll find inspiration and maybe even some humor in a few of these scuba diving quotes.
Let me know in the comments what your favorite one is or if we missed one! We’ll be sure to add it!
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Scuba Diving Quotes
There’s a lot to be said about this otherworldly experience that seems to take hold of us and make us completely obsessed with it and the world in which we get to experience it. The ocean is so inspiring, there have been many scuba diving movies made and scuba diving books written. Even if you’re not a scuba diver, you may find some inspiration in these quotes and perhaps even a little motivation to get your certification as well. You can now learn to scuba dive from home!
Inspirational Scuba Diving Quotes
“75% of the Earth is water. Divers live on a much bigger planet.” – Unknown We dive not to escape life, but for life not to escape us. – Unknown
You’re 30 feet underwater, the ocean is brisk, the slight current is stirring the sand, the colorful fish are swarming, the bright red lobsters are playfully harassing the neon eels — everything seems surreal, especially the fact that you’re breathing underwater. – Natalie Lavery
Diving is an investment of time and money but the rewards can be life-changing, literally. – Andy Cummings
“On the surface of the ocean, men wage war and destroy each other; but down here, just a few feet beneath the surface, there is a calm and peace, unmolested by man” – Jules Verne
Every time you dive, you hope you’ll see something new — some new species. Sometimes the ocean gives you a gift, sometimes it doesn’t. – James Cameron
Why is it that scuba divers and surfers are some of the strongest advocates of ocean conservation? Because they’ve spent time in and around the ocean, and they’ve personally seen the beauty, the fragility, and even the degradation of our planet’s blue heart. – Sylvia Earle
Diving, while it is an “adventure sport,” takes people into a calm and quiet environment — there are no phones, no emails, no way for the terrestrial world to contact you. A diver can drift through the water, undisturbed, and enjoy a period of quiet. The only noises are the hiss of exhalations and the munching of parrotfish. Yes, diving is generally a buddy sport, but your buddy has a regulator in his mouth and can’t talk. – Anonymous
For most people, this is as close to being an astronaut as you’ll ever get. It’s leaving planet Earth behind and entering an alien world. – Mary Frances Emmons
“The best way to observe a fish is to become a fish.” – Jacques Yves Cousteau
“Well… I love moving in extra dimensions. Not just backwards and forwards, but up and down and around. And fins. I love swimming with fins— human feet are practically useless underwater. I love all the unique things you see on each dive. Millions of little aquatic soap operas playing out between all the creatures. And the silence. Well, it’s not really silent down there, but the roar of bubbles blocks any other sound…” – Kirsten Hubbard
“Underwater I hear the water coming to my body, I hear the sunlight penetrating the water.” – James Nestor
“From birth, man carries the weight of gravity on his shoulders. He is bolted to earth. But man has only to sink beneath the surface and he is free.”– Jacques Yves Cousteau
“Your worst day stuck on the surface wishing you could get underwater is better than your best day stuck underwater wishing you could get on the surface.” – Anonymous
“In a few short years you might have to become a scuba diver and go hundreds of feet underwater – It will be the last refuge of pure aura and power on our planet, the oceans’ depths.” – Frederick Lenz 
“I can mention many moments that were unforgettable and revelatory. But the most single revelatory three minutes was the first time I put on scuba gear and dived on a coral reef. It’s just the unbelievable fact that you can move in three dimensions.” – David Attenborough “I just learned how to scuba dive. I’d been scared to rely on one little air hose for oxygen, but swimming with all those fish is exhilarating.” – Cheryl Hines Same Cheryl, same. “Humans are the only creatures with the ability to dive deep in the sea, fly high in the sky, send instant messages around the globe, reflect on the past, assess the present and imagine the future.” – Sylvia Earle”
“She would be half a planet away, floating in a turquoise sea, dancing by moonlight.” Janet Fitch“
“Live your life by a compass, not a clock.” – Stephen Covey
Funny Scuba Diving Quotes
All the scuba diving quotes don’t have to be inspirational. Some can just be funny.
“Why do scuba divers fall backward off a boat? Because if they fell forwards they’d still be in the boat.”– Mark Hoppus
“Hooking on scuba gear and blindly diving into zombie-infested water is a wonderful way to mix the two childhood terrors of being eaten and drowning.”– Max Brooks “There are two types of divers: Those who pee in their wetsuit, and those who lie about it.” – Unknown “Keep your friends close and anemones closer.” – Unknown
Freediving Quotes
“Freediving is about silence…the silence that comes from within.” – Jacques Mayol
“The scuba diver dives to look around. The freediver dives to look inside.” – Umberto Pelizzari
Quotes for the Ocean to Express Your Love
Ever looked out over the horizon from the beach or on a boat into the endless sea of blues and greens and want to write a love letter to the ocean?
If it’s just me, that’s okay too.
Regardless, here are some quotes for the ocean that may take those feelings that hard to describe and put them into words.
The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever. – Jacques Cousteau
“Every time I slip into the ocean, it’s like going home.” – Sylvia Earle
“The sea is only the embodiment of a supernatural and wonderful existence. It is nothing but love and emotion; it is the Living Infinite.” – Jules Verne
“The world’s finest wilderness lies beneath the waves.” – Wyland
“The ocean is everything I want to be: beautiful, mysterious, wild and free.” – Anonymous
“Either you decide to stay in the shallow end of the pool or you go out in the ocean.” – Christopher Reeve
“The sea, the great unifier, is man’s only hope. Now, as never before, the old phrase has a literal meaning: we are all in the same boat.” –Jacques Yves Cousteau
“Take a course in good water and air; and in the eternal youth of Nature, you may renew your own. Go quietly, alone; no harm will befall you.” –John Muir
“It was the Law of the Sea, they said. Civilization ends at the waterline. Beyond that, we all enter the food chain, and not always right at the top.” – Hunter S. Thompson
“To me, the sea is a continual miracle; The fishes that swim–the rocks–the motion of the waves–the ships, with men in them, What stranger miracles are there?” – Walt Whitman
“My mother told me I had a chameleon soul. No moral compass pointing due north, no fixed personality. Just an inner indecisiveness that was as wide and as wavering as the ocean.” — Lana Del Rey
“Dear Ocean, thank you for making us feel tiny, humble, inspired, and salty all at once.” — Unknown
“When these sails go up, mountains fade away
Stars come out, I’m finally free
It’s only the ocean and me” – Only the Ocean by Jack Johnson
“For whatever we lose (like a you or a me), it’s always our self we find in the sea.” – E.E. Cummings
“Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless, like water. Be water, my friend.” – Bruce Lee “You could start now, and spend another forty years learning about the sea without running out of new things to know.” – Peter Benchley “Be alone with the sea for it is there you will find answers to questions you didn’t realize exist.” – Khang Kijarro Nguyen “You never enjoy the world aright, till the Sea itself floweth in your veins.” – Thomas Traherne 
“The ocean was magical to her, its depths and mysteries were boundless, its call irresistible.” – Jeff Mariotte
“I felt the full breadth and depth of the ocean around the sphere of the Earth, […] the endless waves of swimming joy and quiet losses of exquisite creatures with fins and fronds, tentacles and wings, colorful and transparent, tiny and huge, coming and going. There is nothing the ocean has not seen” – Sally Andrew “They say The Pacific has no memory. That’s where I want to live the rest of my life. A warm place with no memory.” – Stephen King, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption: A Story from Different Seasons “If the private life of the sea could ever be transposed onto paper, it would talk not about rivers or rain or glaciers or of molecules of oxygen and hydrogen, but of the millions of encounters its waters have shared with creatures of another nature.” – Federico Chini “The ocean is more ancient than the mountains, and frightened with the memories of the dreams of time” – H.P. Lovecraft
“My soul is full of longing for the secret of the sea. And the heart of the great ocean sends a thrilling pulse through me.” — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
“What would an ocean be without a monster lurking in the dark? It would be like sleep without dreams.” – Werner Herzog
“The ocean is an object of no small terror.” – Edmund Burke
“By his machines, man can dive and remain underwater like a shark; can fly like a hawk in the air; can see atoms like a gnat; can see the system of the universe of Uriel, the angel of the sun; can carry whatever loads a ton of coal can lift; can knock down cities with his fist of gunpowder; can recover the history of his race by the medals which the deluge, and every creature, civil or savage or brute, has involuntarily dropped of its existence; and divine the future possibility of the planet and its inhabitants by his perception of laws of nature.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“The ocean is a place of paradoxes. It is the home of the great white shark, two-thousand-pound killer of the seas, and of the hundred-foot blue whale, the largest animal that ever lived. It is also the home of living things so small that your two hands might scoop up as many of them as there are stars in the Milky Way.” – Rachel Carson
“Consider the subtleness of the sea; how its most dreaded creatures glide under water, unapparent for the most part, and treacherously hidden beneath the loveliest tints of azure. Consider also the devilish brilliance and beauty of many of its most remorseless tribes, as the dainty embellished shape of many species of sharks. Consider, once more, the universal cannibalism of the sea; all whose creatures prey upon each other, carrying on eternal war since the world began.” – Herman Melville
“I love the ocean. I’ve always liked the blue, so tranquil and peaceful and gliding. And the fear of it.” – Siouxsie Sioux
“In a world of seven billion people, where every inch of land has been mapped, much of it developed, and too much of it destroyed, the sea remains the final unseen, untouched, and undiscovered wilderness, the planet’s last great frontier. There are no mobile phones down there, no e-mails, no tweeting, no twerking, no car keys to lose, no terrorist threats, no birthdays to forget, no penalties for late credit card payments, and no dog shit to step in before a job interview. All the stress, noise, and distractions of life are left at the surface. The ocean is the last truly quiet place on Earth.” ― James Nestor, Deep: Freediving, Renegade Science, and What the Ocean Tells Us About Ourselves “The ocean stirs the heart, inspires the imagination and brings eternal joy to the soul. The world’s finest wilderness lies beneath the waves. Into the ocean went a world more fantastic than any imagination could inspire.” – Wyland “We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch – we are going back from whence we came.” – John F Kennedy
Ocean Conservation Quotes
“All the king’s horses and all the king’s men will never gather up all the plastic and put the ocean back together again.” – Charles Moore
“Water and air, the two essential fluids on which all life depends, have become global garbage cans.” – Jacques Cousteau
“When people who love the ocean come together, they can achieve extraordinary things.” – Frances Beinecke
“I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to study the ocean before we destroy it.” – James Cameron
“There is simply no issue more important. Conservation is the preservation of human life on earth, and that, above all else, is worth fighting for.” ― Rob Stewart, Sharkwater: The Photographs
“My position is this. If we can’t protect sanctuaries, if we can’t save the whales, the sharks, the fish, our oceans will die.” – Paul Watson
“In the Mediterranean of my childhood, there were no large groupers, sharks, or whales. All I saw was seaweed and a few fish, smaller than my little diving mask. All the large animals were gone, simply because we had eaten them.” – Enric Sala
“Nothing is more important than saving … the Lions, Tigers, Giraffes, Elephants, Froggies, Turtles, Apes, Raccoons, Beetles, Ants, Sharks, Bears, and, of course, the Squirrels. The humans? The planet does not need humans.” – James Lee
“Seafood is simply a socially acceptable form of bushmeat. We condemn Africans for hunting monkeys and mammalian and bird species from the jungle yet the developed world thinks nothing of hauling in magnificent wild creatures like swordfish, tuna, halibut, shark, and salmon for our meals. The fact is that the global slaughter of marine wildlife is simply the largest massacre of wildlife on the planet.” – Paul Watson
Sylvia Earle Quotes
The Queen of ocean conservation herself. What Jane Goodall does for the land, Sylvia Earle does for the ocean so it’s worth giving her her very owns section of ocean conservation quotes.
“Nothing has prepared sharks, squid, krill and other sea creatures for industrial-scale extraction that destroys entire ecosystems while targeting a few species.” – Sylvia Earle
“There is this sweet spot in time when we have an opportunity to stop killing sharks and tunas and swordfish and other wildlife in the sea before it’s too late.” – Sylvia Earle
“We still have 10 percent of the sharks. We still have half of the coral reefs. However, if we wait another 50 years, opportunities might well be gone.” – Sylvia Earle
“Far and away, the greatest threat to the ocean, and thus to ourselves, is ignorance. But we can do something about that.” – Sylvia Earle
Quotes about Sharks
I know you’re here for the scuba diving quotes but I would be willing to bet money that most scuba divers are pretty excited about seeing sharks or, at the very least, respect the hell out of them. Most of us understand how misunderstood they are and want to do what we can to save the sharks.
“No, the shark in an updated JAWS could not be the villain; it would have to be written as the victim, for, worldwide, sharks are much more the oppressed than the oppressors.” – Peter Benchley
“We still have the illusion that the ocean will recover. That even if we do have to lose sharks, people don’t understand why this matters. The evidence is in front of us, and we fail to take it in and say, “Now I get it. Now I understand.” – Sylvia Earle
“I don’t think you can be a diver without a shark on the list.” – Natalie Dormer
“You’re more likely to drown in the sea of sameness than get eaten by a shark while navigating new waters.” – Amy Jo Martin
“Sharks have a deadly form of claustrophobia. It’s not so much fear of enclosed spaces as it is its inability to exist in them. No one knows why. Some say it’s the metal in aquariums that throws their equilibrium off. But whatever it is, big sharks don’t last long in captivity.” – Neal Shusterman
“Sharks don’t target human beings, and they certainly don’t hold grudges.” – Peter Benchley
“I’m not saying that everyone should swim with sharks, but sometimes you have to jump over your own shadow in order to learn something that you will never forget for the rest of your life. Then you know you can conquer your fears.” – Heidi Klum
“I think sharks are beautiful creatures, and I don’t think we should stop going into the ocean because of them. You drive down the road and you get in an accident, but most people end up driving down the road again. Surfing is you’re going into their home and it’s just a natural part of life. “ – Bethany Hamilton
“Sharks are beautiful animals, and if you’re lucky enough to see lots of them, that means that you’re in a healthy ocean. You should be afraid if you are in the ocean and don’t see sharks.” – Sylvia Earle
“Turns out, I couldn’t catch them – or even get close to them. I realized that sharks are amazing, beautiful animals who have absolutely no interest in checking me out.” – Malin Akerman
“French fries kill more people than guns and sharks, yet nobody’s afraid of French fries.” – Robert Kiyosaki
“Sharks aren’t the monsters we make them out to be.” ― Yasmine Hamdi
“Currently, sharks carry a stigma about them that breeds fear in humans, but in reality, it is the humans who are more of a threat to the sharks than the other way around.” ― Heidi Peltier, Breach
“Sharks have everything a scientist dreams of. They’re beautiful―God, how beautiful they are! They’re like an impossibly perfect piece of machinery. They’re as graceful as any bird. They’re as mysterious as any animal on earth. No one knows for sure how long they live or what impulses―except for hunger―they respond to. There are more than two hundred and fifty species of shark, and everyone is different from every other one.” ― Peter Benchley, Jaws
“Sharks are the lions of the sea. They glamorize the oceanic glory.” – Munia Khan
Scuba Diving Quotes Overview
I hope these scuba diving quotes left you as inspired as me and as motivated to get back in the water as I am. Let me know in the comments what you think and what is your favorite one!
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Where the sky touches the sea you’ll find me 😀
Great quotes!
Thanks! They’re inspiring for sure!
Love these. Thanks for using my quote!