At last I felt released. Describe the efforts undertaken by Douglas to find this moment of release.
Answers
The instructor practiced five days a week for an hour each day with Douglas. The instructor would put a belt around him which had a rope attached to it that went through a pulley on an overhead cable. He held on to the end of the rope and they went back and forth across the pool for hour after hour, day after day, weeks after week. On each trip across the pool, a bit of the panic would seize him. Each time the instructor relaxed his hold on the rope and he went under, some of the old terror would return and his legs would freeze. It was three months before the tension began to slacken. The instructor taught him to put his face under water and exhale and then raise his nose and inhale. He repeated the exercise hundreds of times and bit by bit the part of the panic which used to seize him began to recede. Next he held Douglas at the side of the pool and made him kick with his legs. For weeks they did just that and at first his legs refused to work but gradually they relaxed and finally he could command them. Piece by piece he became a swimmer and when each piece had been perfected, they put the integrated whole in the pool. In April, the instructor told him that he could swim and he asked him to dive off and swim the length of the pool with a crawl stroke. The experience of learning to conquer his fear had a deep meaning for him because only those who have known stark terror and conquered it can appreciate what it means to overcome that terror. He says that all we have to fear is fear itself. He had experience the sensation of dying and the terror he felt it could produce. The will to live seemed to him greater and at last he felt released, free to walk the trails and climb the peaks and brush aside fear.
Regards
William Douglas overcame his fear of water through perseverance and courage.
In the chapter Deep Water he narrates an incident form his life showing us how he overcame his fear of water through perseverance and courage.
He had to work very hard to overcome his deeply ingrained fear of water that he had got infected with at the YMCA pool after the tragic incident. The fear spoilt all his excursions with his friends. Whenever he accompanied his friends to Cascades, Tieton, Warm Lake, the fear of water seized him, his legs paralysed and icy horror grabbed his heart.
Finally one October he hired an instructor to learn swimming. The instructor put a belt around him. He attached the belt around him. He attached the belt to a cable that ran overhead. He held on the rope and the author tried to swim back and forth across the pool, hour after hour, day after day, week after week. The author took three months to learn the basics. Then the instructor taught him how to exhale underwater and how to raise his nose and inhale. Then he taught him how to kick the water with his legs.
After teaching and perfecting the basics, he asked the author to swim the length of the pool. From the next day onwards, the author swam the length of the pool all by himself. After that there was no turning back. He swam across Lake Wentworth and Warmlake. That is how the author overcame his fear.