So, as a swim team mom I spend every night poolside while my kids are in practice. Every Saturday morning my husband and I get up at the crack of dawn to cheer on our 3 little munchkins in their swim meets. We celebrate the little wins with them and are blissfully happy with being the obnoxious parents on the sidelines screaming at the top of our lungs "PULL" and running along the side with them as the swim. All the while, by the way, thinking that these kids can actually hear us...which they can't...but we don't care. We are "those" parents.
So today, like any other day, I was sitting poolside watching my kids in practice. One of their coaches asked me yesterday if the kids could stay for the following practice as well as doing their own practice. I, of course, said YES. My kids have some amazing coaches who have helped them reach a potential, a confidence, and a skill set that I've not seen them achieve until this year. As a result I am more than willing to accept any additional instruction they can get. So the kids swam during their practice, 45 minutes, and then swam with the older kids during their practice, another 45 minutes. It is here that I learned a lesson from my 10 yr old.
Ariana...how do I describe her. She is our oldest, so our first. She gave us the biggest lesson in what it really meant to be a parent and care about someone else more than yourself straight out of the shoot by spending her first week of life in the NICU. Since then she has had eye surgery, she has lazy eye, she will have surgery again soon, her eyes don't work together so she has confidence issues, she is shy and introverted by nature, and she is dyslexic. Oft times she will ask me "why did God pick me for this". She has to fight, claw, and dig deep for everything she does and accomplishes. We enrolled her in swim team because it gave her a "level" playing field. It was the one sport that didn't depend so much on her eye sight nor "on land" coordination, which she struggles with because her eyes don't want to work together.
The kids swam, with the two practice sessions, I figured out a total of about 1800 yards. I watched Ariana practicing. She got tired, real tired. She could have quit...but she didn't. She had a moment of "oh crap, I can't do that" and at that moment her coach (who must have seen the look in her eyes) said, "Ariana, you can do this, I know you can" So she did. She is not the fastest swimmer, she's not the best swimmer. Heck, her dive pretty much sucks, she's not great at the turns, BUT she doesn't quit. She knows she's probably not going to be #1 but she doesn't care. She still works just as hard as if she might just win this time.
Even in school, this child has to work 10 times harder than any other student for every grade, trying to make up for how her dyslexia complicates things. Her teacher told me the other day that even on days that you can tell Ariana doesn't want to be there she still gives 100% every single day. That impresses the heck out of me. Not to mention, she's pulling all A's and only one B. She would have every reason in the book to quit, give up, slack off because she's got an excuse to do so. But, she doesn't. She works harder and smarter and loves to learn.
So I thought about that. So often we can feel defeated or that we can't win. Does that mean we quit? NO!!!! Take a lesson from my 10 yr old. When your hurdles are greater than others and you are not the best of the best, don't quit! When there's boulders in your path that seem so big, keep fighting and keep going. You may not be the fastest but what matters most is that you finish.
Ariana, because of her personality, is afraid of every new thing. But she willingly accepts each new challenge and takes it on head first. She's not afraid to work. Even if she won't "win" she will still give 100% effort. THAT, my friends, is winning.
Point is, we all have hurdles. We all have challenges. Don't quit dammit! If my 10 yr old can keep going so can we!
