How freediving skills are helping people relax in an ever-changing world

It's easy to look at Adam Stern and decide freediving is not for you.

Descending 93 metres into an underwater trench and having to hold your breath for six-and-a-half minutes isn't for everyone.

At least that's what many people think.

«The average human walking on the street can actually hold their breath between four and five minutes before they're unconscious,» Adam says.

«Sometimes freediving has this perception of being this really big terrifying risky thing because they've seen videos of people diving 100 metres underwater.

»Everyone can freedive. It's an innate ability for all humans."

Despite growing up on the shores of Copacabana on the Central Coast, Adam didn't try freediving until a backpacking trip around Thailand when he was21.

«Because you have no idea what a great freediver you already are, you go and do it and feel like you've discovered a superpower. Like, I can do this incredible thing that I didn't know existed,» Adam says.

«People tend to, when they get into it, tend to identify as freedivers very strongly.»

Now Australia's freediving record holder, the «Sea Lord» as he's sometimes referred to, teaches people from across the world on his Deep Weeks — a week-long «freediving festival slash learning event».

With the sport growing in popularity, mums, tradies and school leavers often sign up for the courses.

«Most people after a day or two diving are pretty comfortable diving between 10 and 20 metres,» Adam says.

«My job is to sit there while they do the thing they can already do.»

Kate Borysuk thought she could barely swim, let alone freedive.

«I'm from a city in a very cold part of Russia,» Kate says.

«The first time I saw the ocean I was 25 years old … I was terrified.»

Since moving to Australia six years ago, she's