Before and After…

I am currently 3 weeks out from my 2nd competition!  I can’t even describe how much I enjoyed my first competition so I am even more excited now that I have an idea of what to expect!  I am continuing to get a little leaner, which is the goal, and slow and somewhat steady seems to be my body’s prefered method, but I will take it.

So it has been about 25 weeks since I first started on this journey (Saturday after Thanksgiving).  I have lost 12lbs and about 1.5 inches around my waist..so far 😉  So to do something slightly uncomfortable, I will share with you all the picture of me before it all started.  You must excuse the horrible “posing”, if you can even call it that, since I was just being introduced to standing that way and let’s be honest, I was not sure of what I was doing or that I should have been flexing everything!  But anyway, it is attached to another picture I took of myself 1 week out from my first competition.  So what you see took me 19 weeks to accomplish.  A lot of the first few weeks (month) were trial and error and after losing 2lbs the first week, I hadn’t lost another lb until midway through January, but my body composition was changing.  Normally I would have fallen off the wagon by then, but I stayed focused and worked hard in order to reach my goal.

November  (mid)                               April 7th                              April 14th

I have learned a lot since I have started and have since then decided to  my workouts and diet with the help of Jason Phillips.  I have started to see even more changes, while eating more calories and workout out less..always a plus!  So I will keep you all posted on how things progress over the next few weeks!

Little Under 2 Weeks!

It has been way too long since my last post!  I have been playing catch up with school and work, while training and prepping food each day.  It has been a lot of work, but I am loving it!  I have always enjoyed staying active and thought of myself as a fairly healthy eater, with my weeks consisting of healthy foods while my weekends were looser (occasional pizza, beer, wings, ice cream, etc).  In order to prepare for my figure competition, my active lifestyle hasn’t diminish outside of some minor adjustments, thankfully!  I embrace an active lifestyle and enjoy it.  Food wise, it has been hard at times, especially when around food that isn’t on my plan or people eating what I can’t.  Do I miss “normal” food?  Yes!  I love pizza, wings, and ice cream (most likely I will devour at least one of these the night after my show!) but I also can remember thinking to myself one day (a couple of months into my diet), that I have never felt this great before!  I am not as tired during the day like I once was and I feel better all together!   It is amazing how eliminating unclean foods can make you feel more alive.

Another interesting discovery was one night when I fell off the wagon, (almost a whole bagel and cookies one of mom’s of a girl I coach made) it was in a matter of 5 minutes when I suddenly felt gross–seriously, like crap.  My body wasn’t used to processing all of the sugar I just inhaled and I felt the effects immediately!  It made me think of how my body used to be and that I would have never felt this sugar rush prior to eating clean.

The past 18 weeks have been such a learning process and a thing you learn is there is not one way to diet or train for a competition.  Everyone has ideas of what is best training or diet wise, but ultimately, it is about finding what works best for you.  I am in no way close to finding out what works best for me, but I hope to do that throughout the years.  I have also learned that consistency is key.  I have tried diets and tried eating healthy in the past and always felt so frustrated after a few weeks or a month when I haven’t seen results and at that time.  When I started dieting for my show, it took me a couple of months before I realized even though I haven’t lost more than 2 pounds (all in the first week!), my body was starting to look better.  There is no quick fix to losing body fat.  It is simply consistency, hard work, and patience!

Confidence with Deryck Toles!

Two weeks ago my boss and I discussed talking about confidence with the girls for our Wednesday meeting. To switch things up, our other coach brought up the idea to bring someone in to give a talk. I asked my good friend Mike Cerbus who is a top national weightlifter to see if that would be something he would enjoy talking about but he ended up having a meeting that day. He recommended contacting Deryck Toles. So I emailed Deryck that afternoon and he was more than happy to give the talk two days later! He took time out from work and parent teacher meetings in order to meet with our team. He did a great job and the girls really enjoyed it.

Little bit about Deryck Toles. Deryck is from Warren, OH and has played football at Penn State and then a year for the Colts. He was injured and had to have two corrective surgeries which ultimately ended his career. He then decided to focus on what he could do with his life other than play football and came up with Inspiring Minds. He is the president of I.M. which works with students 9th-12th grade who need help in writing, math, resumes, college search, etc. It provides opportunities for these students that they would not normally get; to inspire them to realize that anything is possible and that they shouldn’t be afraid of failure. They go on big yearly trips to major cities, meet professional athletes and artists, etc.

So with his permission, I have uploaded his video for your viewing pleasure! There is part 1 and 2 due to the length. Enjoy and thanks Deryck!

Clip 1:

Clip 2:

Can You Give 110%?

Anyone who has taken a math course or has encountered any sort of math in the real world knows what 100% means. 100% of a 20 dollar bill is 20 dollars. 100% of an apple pie is the whole pie. 100% basically boils down to all of something. So what does it mean when someone says “give 110%”? I have heard this many times as an athlete, coach, and throughout life in general as I am sure many of you have as well. But is there such a thing as 110%? Personally, I may add it to my pet peeves list. Mathematically it is impossible to have 110%. How are you going to have 110% of an apple pie or 110% on a test in which you scored a 50 out of 50? No, I am not a perfectionist about everything or a mathematician, but I do like exactness in life. I am that person, when asked for the time, will say the exact time without rounding because I would assume that’s what they want, as well as what I would expect.

For those that use the phrase “giving 110%”, i would assume their expectation is having someone give more than they think is possible; giving it all that they have and “more”. But is giving more than you think is possible giving 110%, or is it actually overcoming the mental barrier of a perceived threshold and finding a boundless self-actualization–allowing yourself to break free to finally close in on 100%. The way I see it is, if you give it all that you have and lay it on the line, you aren’t giving more than 100%, you are giving 100%.

But what does it take to give 100%? I bring this up to my athletes all the time. They will be running sprints and, if I notice that a good handful of them aren’t even close to where they should be, I will ask them to raise their hands if they felt that they just gave 100%. The amount of hands that are usually raised is typically surprising. Equally amazing is the amount of hands that don’t get raised when asked who could have given a little more than they just did on the last effort. When asked that as an athlete, I can remember being conflicted on how to answer the question because did I try my best, I thought so, but at the same time, could I have done one thing better? Probably. So was that 100%?

I set a goal my junior year to try to give 100% effort every practice. Now some may think that is a good goal, and it was, but it is also extremely challenging. I set the same goal my senior year in hopes of doing a better job at nearing this goal. The main intent was to finish my season without any doubt and knowing I gave it my best shot. Do I think I gave 100% every day in practice? I am not sure, but I believe I came as close as I could have and don’t have any regrets.

Next blog in the near future…what does it mean to give 100%…stay tuned 🙂

Winning Attitude Meeting

Two weeks ago we discussed “Winning Attitudes”. This was another of my Wednesday talks and unfortunately I used my ipad for my notes but cannot find them anywhere so this is purely from memory..scary thought.

So I started the meeting with the question: 1. Who is excited for the meet Friday? In my mind I saw it going a little differently, at least more than the 5 or so hands that were raised. So I ended up asking the question two more times, with the third time being the best, but still questionable on whether or not I asked them the above question or if they were excited for a tooth extraction. My boss was a little peeved with their lack of enthusiasm so he started asking some of them why they didn’t raise their hand. We ranged from “I didn’t hear what she asked” to “you just didn’t see my hand” and lastly, we had a girl who was disappointed she didn’t learn a new dive and she was nervous for the meet. To say the whole situation bursted my bubble of enthusiasm would describe the slight laughter that came out of my mouth as shock/disappointment/questioning whether I have been wasting my breath all year. But moving on…

2. Who has a place goal in mind? So a handful of girls raised their hands and shared what events they were hoping to win.

3. What is your goal time for this meet/what are you going to go Friday in order to win? I asked this of the girls who said their goal was to win an event. They all gave me a specific time they thought would be fast enough to win their event.

4. What will it take to win? I then read off our competitions times they went in their events from the week before. I think some of the swimmers were shocked to hear how fast some of the times were and that their goal time they thought would win it wasn’t going to be good enough (for most).

The point of these questions were to make them understand that they can’t simply want to win. They have to do their homework on the opposing team. If they want to win an event, they need to know what it will take and if they are capable of going that time. I reminded them of the few close meets that we’ve had that we should have potentially won, but didn’t because they didn’t believe they could win their event or know who they would have to race and what it would take to win. A winning attitude isn’t just having a desire to win, it is being smart and doing all of the little things as well, including studying up on your opponents.

I then showed them this clip:

The point of this clip was that even though we each have a job, we are all in this together to accomplish the same goal. A team that believes in one goal and is willing to fight for that goal is more likely going to accomplish it and can overcome a group of individuals.

The next clip I showed was:

This clip is one that they have shared amongst themselves but seem to like.

Three quotes that I had shared with them throughout the meeting:

“Ability is what you’re capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.” – Lou Holtz

“There’s always the motivation of wanting to win. Everyone has that. But a champion needs, in his attitude, a motivation above and beyond winning.” – Pat Riley

“You were born to win, but to be a winner, you must plan to win, prepare to win, and expect to win.”- Zig Zigler

What Will Tip Your Seesaw?

Well it has been 4 weeks since I have made my resolutions and about 3 weeks since my last post I believe?  This is not something I am proud of and I don’t really like not having the time to sit down to think/write.  To define the past 4 weeks as a whirlwind would be on point (haven’t even fully unpacked from my move back in December!)  Do I mind it?  Only on occasion when I don’t have time to do EVERYTHING I would like to do, but I love being busy and tend to overload my plate and I am not sure I know how to live otherwise.  The last few weeks have consisted of training trip, meets, work for work, getting back onto a workout/lifting schedule (thank the Lord), starting school back up, and prepping meals like crazy.  If you ask any of my roommates, they will say I am either in my bed sleeping or in the kitchen making food.

On the topic of prepping food, I am currently less than 12 weeks out from my competition!  I am nervous at times realizing that I do not have much time to get to where I need to be, but I also know that changes to the eye are slow to come and it’s a marathon to the body not a sprint.  I have definitely seen changes and continue to throughout the process.  Last week I lowered my calories slightly and upped my cardio (intervals).  I noticed a dramatic change with that and hope to continue to see changes throughout the next few weeks.

What are You Striving For?

As mentioned in my first post and throughout, my goal is to motivate not just my team, but others as well.  I am always willing to help others out whether it is with workouts or nutrition advice, but what I find is that, like resolutions, most people give up after a few weeks.  It becomes difficult, change is slow, and they become frustrated.  I have been there many times myself, but as the saying goes “Nothing worthwhile is easily obtained”.  Changes are difficult and take time!  Like I mentioned in my post about goals, you have to decide if your goal is something you really want to accomplish.  Make a goal that works for you and is important to you!  Maybe you have a cruise/vacation coming up, want to compete, or simply fit into size 6 pants again.  But it has to be something that is going to tip your seesaw.

A Seesaw?

I was talking to a girl a couple of weeks ago about weight loss and goals and she mentioned that she has a hard time finding a goal that motivates her to stick with a diet plan and workout routine long enough to reach it.  I then told her “It is kind of like a seesaw.  Not until the see-saw dips too low on one side will you make that decision.  Not until you find that goal that is more important than eating bad or not working out will you be able to accomplish it because if you don’t care enough, then you probably won’t.”  And yes, it may sound a little harsh, but it is the truth.  Plus she knows that it is only tough love!

Falling off the Seesaw… (so to speak)

This weekend we traveled Saturday-Sunday and in order to be prepared and set myself up for success, I packed a ton of food (chicken, oatmeal, homemade protein bars, almonds, cauliflower, spinach, broccoli, etc).  I didn’t want to be tempted to make a bad decision.  So while I was at dinner at one of our swimmers’ homes eating my chicken, cauliflower, and salad, I watched everyone else eat pasta with meat sauce, bread, celery with pb, chex mix, and cupcakes.  It was torture!  Oh what I would do to eat those things!  But I restrained because I knew my goal.  So the whole weekend went really well food wise, that is until I came home Sunday night.  I brought the bagels and cream cheese into the house in order to put the cream cheese into the fridge.  I thought to myself, my do those everything bagels look good right now.  I will just have a little piece of one.  Fast forward to 1 minute later, I ate almost the whole bagel which I dipped into strawberry cream cheese as well as a few cookies that one of the swimmers’ moms made for us.  Could I have stopped myself?  Yes.  I could have walked away, but I didn’t.  It was what I would describe as a drug addict seeing (whatever drug you prefer to add here) out in the open without anyone around to stop them.  It was disappointing and slightly embarrassing that I lacked self-control, but it happens and I am over it.  The interesting thing though was the feeling I felt 5 minutes after the fact.  While I was inhaling the bagel and cookies at 96 mph, I was enjoying every second of the fat and carb filled deliciousness.  But then all of a sudden I felt gross.  My throat felt kind of tight and I just felt slightly sick like my body was revolting my poor decision.  After being on such a strict diet, my body got used to eating clean and once I fed it crap filled with sugar, my body freaked.  So I did some bodyweight squats, pushups, and abs to use some of that sugar and then went to bed.  The next day I craved more of what I had eaten the night before (and embarrassingly enough, I had a couple more cookies and then tossed the rest out knowing I had to or else I would continue on this path of self-destruction).  I felt sick once again.  The rest of the day went as planned.  I got back on my horse (or seesaw) and haven’t strayed from the plan since.  I know I will be tempted in the future, especially as I get closer to competition and my body fat drops, but I will deal with that as it comes.  I know that for me, I need to not have any “bad” food around me and if need be, I need to get myself out of the house in order to stop myself from wanting to eat.

Could I have given up on my goal and decided this sucks and I’d rather eat what tastes better?  Yes.  It is hard and for those that know me, they are proud of me and are surprised I am doing this well.  I could use the excuse that “I love food too much” and that “I don’t have the discipline” like I hear others saying which I have probably said myself at times, but those are only excuses.  Anyone is capable of accomplishing their goals, you just have to want it more than what it will take to accomplish it.  You need to tip your seesaw.

So if you have given up on a resolution or a goal of yours, it is not too late!  Restart now, get back up on that seesaw, and keep going!  Don’t you want to be able to look back a year from now and be happy you took that first step and didn’t quit?  Just imagine…now go do!

Who is on Your Dream TEAM: Together Everyone Achieves More

I am currently reading a book written by John C. Maxwell called Put Your Dream to the Test
. It is about finding your dream, how passionate you are about it, what you should expect in order to fulfill your dream, and how surrounding yourself with a “dream team” is crucial for successfully accomplishing your dream. I think this is the case for life in general. Have you ever heard you can judge someone by the company they keep? Well it’s true. I know there are those friends that you have known since you were young or you enjoy having a good time with, but might not necessarily have them meet your boss. But what about the others, or are they all like that? Personally, I have enjoyed surrounding myself with people who bring “something to the table” and make me a better person. These people not only intrigue me and make me think, but also challenge me to become better. These are also people who would be there for me if I ever needed anything and I would be there for them as well. Now these are people who I consider true friends/mentors. My parents used to always wonder why I never had that many friends growing up and still don’t, but I never desired excess or having fake friendships. I was content having the few I did and most of them were teammates of mine, but they can arguably be considered family. I do love meeting new people and getting to know them and what makes them tick, but as you grow up you realize that you are lucky to have more than one friend that would have your back no matter what. Every once in a while you get lucky and create a deep friendship with someone who helps you on your journey throughout life and vise versa.

The point of this post is coming from left field, but one of my friends/mentors mentioned reading my blog and gave a recommendation of having my resolution set at 30 minutes of reading every day not once a week (adding up to only 2 hrs a month). I had honestly thought that I should read 30 minutes a day (I have read enough books telling me to do this), but I got scared. I set a low goal because I was worried I wouldn’t keep the resolution with everything else on my plate if I set it higher. Then having mentioned that, I thought about all of the times I find myself watching tv at night even if it is for only 30 minutes and realized how ridiculous that sounded and I knew I just have to make myself do it. My friend/mentor said that once you make it part of the pattern it will become a habit and then I will find myself doing it without even thinking about it. So when I would have settled with making sure I read at least 30 minutes a week, he challenged me to be better. How do I expect myself to be better or reach a dream if I just do what I think is possible? But that’s what your “dream team” is for. They are there to push you to do what either you know you should do but are having trouble making yourself do or to challenge you to do what you may think is impossible. Like the acronym for TEAM : Together Everyone Achieves More. Without others, you will never accomplish as much compared to having others beside you pushing you/encouraging you.

So a special thanks to those that push me and keep me focused on my goals…you all know who you are..or should! 🙂

New Years Resolutions…Finally.

I know it has been a week or so since New Years, but I have been in a whirlwind with the holidays and having left for training trip with the team. The resort we are staying at does not have free internet (didn’t think places still charged for that!) so I am at a Starbucks writing this up since I realize it must be done soon! I know I only need internet to actually update my blog, not write a post, but for some reason, I feel I do my best thinking/writing at a coffee shop 🙂 Maybe it is just the feeling I get when I am drinking a hot cup of coffee; the light jazz music in the background; and the smells, sounds, and voices of people enjoying each others’ company. I just walk in and instantly smile and feel relaxed. So with my grande coffee in hand, I have come up with a few New Years Resolutions:

Health:
In off-season, limit cheating to one meal a week or two small items a week.

Become a better cook by making one new meal every other week in the off-season (was originally every week but the plan is to stick with the resolution and I can foresee my schedule!)

Career:
Research for 30 minutes a week on career related topics (swimming/performance training)

Read self-improvement books for 30 minutes three times a week

Weaknesses:
Work on staying more organized by tidying up my desk/room once every week

Strengths:
Further develop my strengths…need to think more on this one and how to go about doing this.

Personal:
Continue to make choices based on what is best for my development as a person. Do what makes me happy 🙂

Write a new post for my blog at least once a week

Goals:
Compete at Buckeye classic in April and place top 3 (I would be happy with this result but since this is my first competition and judging can be less black and white at times, it may be slightly out of my control)

Compete 3 times this year

Figure out where my passions lie (I know not very measurable)

Strengths and Passions: Next blog will most likely be along the lines of these topics.

New Year, New Slate..What Do You Want to Accomplish?

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and got to spend it with those that are important to you! It is a great time to give thanks to those in your life and to embrace the true meaning of Christmas.

So right around the corner is New Years, and with New Years comes resolutions, goals, or things you would like to do (or a combo of all 3).

Resolutions are basically goals (defined as something that is formal expression of opinion or intention, something that is an absolute, you will do it) for the upcoming year to make improvements on one’s health whether it’s physically, spirituality, mentally, or personally. Resolutions should be “agreements” you can keep with yourself throughout the whole year. An example of a resolution would be to give your room or your house/apartment a solid cleaning once every month. Obviously you would need to clean dishes/bathrooms/kitchen way more frequently, but I’m talking dusting, de-cluttering, etc. Two other examples may be to eat gluten-free or to make a home cooked meal five nights a week.

Not only can you make resolutions, but you can also create goals (something you plan to achieve, you see the end result, then take steps to get there). Goals can be anything from monthly sales goals, end of the year body fat percentage goal, or running a mile in 6 minutes. These are all great goals, but the thing to remember about goals is that there should be weekly, biweekly, or monthly goals or “stepping stones” to get you to your yearly goal. You can’t simply want to be at 16% bodyfat by December and then hope your internal motivation will keep you disciplined to get you there by the end of the year. Having monthly goals will help keep you in check and will prevent you from falling off the horse..so to speak. Another great way to stay motivated throughout the whole year is to have competition! Make a bet with a friend whether it is to see who can sell more insurance before the end of the year or who can reach their ideal body weight first. Make sure to have a great prize at the end worth looking forward to besides your potential bonus or new sexy body 😉

The third option is checking things off of a bucket list. A bucket list is a list of things you would like to do before you die whether it is skydiving, hike the Appalachian trail, or write a book. If you don’t have a bucket list, take time and come up with a list of things you would like to do/accomplish/see before you die. Then for the new year, pick a couple you feel you are capable of doing within the year. These do not need to cost money nor do they have to be extravagant. For example, maybe you want to learn how to salsa dance or raise money for an organization. These things can be done fairly cheaply. Regardless, make sure you estimate potential costs for what you would like to do in the new year; you want it to be realistic and possible.

Now before you begin, here are a few things you must remember about resolutions, goals, and bucket list choices:

1. Resolutions and goals must be measurable. If your resolution is to cook at home more often instead of eating out, pick how many nights a week you will do this. If you simply state you want to cook at home more often, you will never know if you have accomplished your goal.

2. Resolutions, goals, and bucket list choices must be realistic.  If you can currently run a 10 minute mile, a 4:30 minute mile may be a little far fetched. If you decide this year you want to check off going to Italy off of your Bucket list, make sure you can afford a trip like this.

3. Reward yourself! Make monthly goals and if you meet these goals, treat yourself whether it is to a mini vacation, a nice dinner out, or to new workout shorts! Having mini rewards will help keep the fire lit throughout the year.

4. As stated in the goal paragraph, find a friend and make your mutual goal a friendly competition! You both don’t have to have the same goal and that may even be unrealistic, probably in most cases, but it should be equally challenging. Maybe you bet that whoever reaches the goal first, loses the most weight, or makes the most sales wins and they will be treated by getting dinner paid for or whatever your agreement is.

5. Have fun! Making resolutions are a great way to make yourself better and continue to improve but you should want to do them and enjoy the process!

Now it is time to make some goals for myself! I will post these soon…and I did check something off of my potential bucket list yesterday! I went skiing for the first time yesterday (swimmers typically are shunned from anything dangerous on land so we don’t ruin our swimming careers). Having not played any other sport besides swimming, I do lack coordination when it comes to dribbling or kicking and running at the same time, but thanks to swimming, I do have good core stabilization/strength. I only fell 4 times on 6 runs (2 of which were on a blue). Yes, that may seem like a lot, but I was going very fast due to my lack of ability to slow down effectively so it was a miracle I stayed up on a lot of the runs 🙂

Happy Resolution Making! Post some of your New Years Resolutions on my blog!

More About Me: My Future Aspiration :)

So far I have kept this blog strictly professional in the sense of not including anything personal, but I feel that if you are able to connect with something, it makes reading it more enjoyable, more or less being apart of the journey.  So, I will give you a glimpse into my past and what I am doing right now outside of trying to make a difference.

As you have read so far, I am a swim coach (not sure if I mentioned the swimming aspect but I’m sure you could have picked that up in at least one of the posts).  I started swimming when I was 8 years old because playing a sport was important to my parents.  When my mom asked what sport I wanted to play, I pondered it for about 30 seconds before stating I wasn’t sure since I didn’t like sweating.  No I was never one of those girly girls, but you know that feeling of sweating in clothes (and I definitely still hate that feeling), it is extremely uncomfortable unless I am working out and in that case, bring it on!  So my mom suggested swimming since my dad was also a swimmer and was currently coaching as well.

So I began my swimming “career”, if you will.  I had to tryout to make the swim team (swim 25yds) before I could join and according to my parents, I stopped about mid-pool hoping I could just be done with the lap only to have the coach tell me I was only halfway done.  I made the team and proceeded to cry sporadically for the next couple of years hoping that this would convince my parents that I shouldn’t have to go.  Unfortunately, for me at the time, my parents were not soft and did not give in.

I had considered wanting to quit a few times in middle school, but I did not want to disappoint my dad and figured eventually it had to get better.  So fast forward to about high school.  I finally started enjoying swimming more.  High school meets made swimming worthwhile and I slowly started to gain momentum.  My junior year I took off in one of my events and my senior year I dropped in my other event.  I was finally seeing results!  I decided I wanted to swim in college and see how fast I could go.  I looked at about 4-5 different schools and decided to go to the one I felt had the best team environment and had a program that would push me to become better.

Throughout my four years in college athletics, I had improved more than I could have imagined and I can still remember meeting with my head coach before I decided to sign and he told me that he could see me going a 1:01 in the 100 breast.  I was currently a 1:08 and did eventually go a 1:05 by the end of my senior year, but a 1:01 sounded great to me!  How crazy to think that he guessed it right on.  I ended up dropping over 4 seconds in my 100 breast, 17 seconds in my 200 breast, and 11 seconds in my 200 IM by the end of my swimming career (best times from senior year in high school to senior year in college).  To say the very least, I had an indescribable experience and had the opportunity to be coached by one of the best coaches in the country.  I was also fortunate enough to swim with a club coach in the summer that would work on the technical aspects of my stroke.  These coaches combined with my work ethic allowed me to qualify for Olympic Trials and NCAA’s, meets that I wanted to qualify for more than anything.  I also had very good parental support (and siblings of course!).  My mom was more for the moral support and continues to help me through difficult situations dealing with others while my dad understood the struggle through the sport as well as the daily successes in practice.  I also had a great “family” that changed with each new year but I believe had the best chemistry out of any team in the country.

As many coaches tell their athletes, college athletics prepares you for life.  You learn time management, you learn how to get through tough times, how to work as a team, and that you get what you work for.  Well, what they don’t tell you is how easy it can be compared to life at times.  I don’t think a lot of people struggle adjusting to life from being an athlete, but I think those that live for their sport do.  I was definitely one of those people and my first year out was an adjustment to say the least.  Swimming was my life.  It’s hard to explain and some people may think they understand, but as they say you can never understand someone else’s reality, and this is one of those times.  I loved making goal times, challenging myself in practice, pushing others, constantly thinking about my strokes, helping a teammate in need, taking care of my body, competing, etc.  I struggled the first year, having to adjust to the workload, but as I went through the program, I got better and better and became a great practice swimmer.  I tried to give 100% effort every day in practice.  I made that a goal of mine junior year and then I tried to do an even better job of trying to reach 100% every day my senior year.  The goal was to be consistently good every day, but on those days where my body was fighting me, I would focus on the technical aspects of my stroke in order to get something out of the practice.

After graduating, I decided to get a coaching job and see how I liked that side of the fence.  The whole first year, I wanted to just jump in and compete again.  I struggled with the administrative tasks (having never done anything like it before) as well as trying to deal with the emotions I was experiencing.  After an adjustment year and quite the negative experience, I was not even sure I wanted to continue coaching and thought I would just apply for grad school.  But being the stubborn person I am, I did not want to let someone else dictate my life and make me feel incompetent, so I got another coaching job and am also taking graduate classes as well.  My second year was an adjustment period having to learn different sets of ropes, but was a lot better.  This year I am not only trying to be more successful at my daily tasks, but also become a better coach and do what I would consider going above and beyond in order to make a difference.

You may ask if I still miss swimming.  Yes I miss it a lot, but not as much as I once did.  I have come to the realization that my body probably couldn’t handle it (lots of groin inflammation problems jr/sr year and still have issues at times).  But i miss the intense gratification I got from competing and even daily in practice.  Unlike team sports, individual sports, especially those that go by times, offer very distinct feedback and when you are used to receiving feedback that way, it is hard to adjust to life’s form of feedback.  It is not black and white, but gray.  Making measurable goals in life is not as easy as saying I want to go this time.  I am still trying to figure out how to make life goals, but in the meantime, I have decided to do something I have wanted to do for a while now.  I thought about doing triathlon and races, but swimming is hard to do on your own (if I decided to do masters) and coaching interferes with masters’ practice times, and I have been having IT band troubles (can’t really run long distances), so I finally decided, why not do what I have wanted to do since college.

I am going to compete in a figure competition.  Figure was not my first choice.  I wanted to do a bikini competition, but from many years of swimming and lifting, I have developed a good muscular base and am naturally more broad and not petite by any means.  So the Director at the Rec center on campus (Brandy- she is a natural bodybuilder) told me as soon as she saw me that I would do well in figure.  So figure it is!  I am nervous, but also excited to do something different and definitely challenging.  Being a food lover, this may be the hardest thing I will have ever done, having to restrict my diet.

I have already started the dieting process and this is my third week.  It has been slow, but Brandy needed me to start somewhere and then we will adjust accordingly.

When: April 14, 2012- Buckeye Classic in Columbus Ohio

You may wonder why I feel the need to do something competitive.  Well this is my outlet for personal achievement.  At times it is difficult to measure success being an assistant coach, but having personal goals and aspirations on the side helps with the sense of gratification.  I have been feeling the desire to do something before I turn 25 and to go along with the past 6 months’ theme of achieving all that I can especially while I am still single, this fits right in!  Do I know where I will be in 5-10 years?  No, but I am excited to see where life takes me.

Like the ocean, life can knock you down and toss you around, but it can also take you to where you never thought possible, but first you have to jump!

There is a lot more I could go into detail about, but I need to actually do something else today besides write a really long post, so I will take you through my journey in addition to the motivational things I am doing with the team.