Gymnastics Taught Me Life Skills

I spent countless hours in the musky, old, smelly gymnastics building working to perfect my skills and become a great athlete. Going to gymnastics became my whole life; sometimes I accepted it and sometimes it was a pain to have to sacrifice my plans to go train. What I did not understand at the time, was that I was learning way more at CRAG than just how to be an athlete. I was also learning how to be respectful to adults, and how to use criticism to improve and push to my full potential.

One day of practice I will never forget, was when I was working on the bars trying to score high enough on my routine so I could compete with it in the upcoming meet. I started by putting on my sweaty, chalky grips and mentally visualized my bar routine. I stepped up to the springboard and thought of how bad I wanted to hit this routine, not just for myself, but for my parents and my coaches as well. Even though it was just practice, I wanted to pass the routine so I could make it better for the actual meet. The head coach, Todd says “Okay Megan you’re up”! I presented and then started my routine. I jumped off the board and my hands hit the stiff bar and then I was gliding through it so easily I think I could have done it in my sleep. I got to the landing and my feet hit the blue mat and I took some steps, which is not a good thing to do, but it could have been worse. I presented with a huge smile and ran to Todd to hear my score. As he told me, my head dropped and the disappointment spread through my body like a virus. I thought I did well but it was not good enough. He started talking to me about things I need to change for next time but my gaze was locked on the chalked up blue mat and only half listening to his words because I didn't want to cry in front of him. I jump at the sound of his voice yelling, “Megan you look at me when I’m talking to you! Do you understand”? I replied in a shy “Yes” and then the tears filled my eyes. He saw me crying and strictly said “There is no crying in CRAG Gymnastics and if you are going to, go to the bathroom” and so I left. Later that week I changed my attitude toward the routine by accepting that I did not do my best and understanding that there is always room for improvement. I went back to the gym and tried again, this time with an optimistic attitude that no matter what everything would turn out okay; and eventually I passed it and was able to compete the bar routine at the gymnastics meet.  

After this experience I felt sad and embarrassed but as I got older I began to understand more that my coach was teaching me important skills that would stick with me through my life. Also, I became more comfortable making eye contact with adults while they were talking to me, which I used to struggle with. Now in my current life I respect my cheer coaches, my parents and teachers and I feel more comfortable communicating with them. In addition to learning how to be respectful, I learned that criticism is meant to help me improve not make me feel bad about myself. This was a difficult concept for me to grasp at such a young age because I would just sulk in the loss of self confidence instead of using the criticism to boost my motivation.  Training gymnastics at such a young age, led me to push myself to make my skills better, instead of just thinking that I was not good enough. This can be applied to so many things in life because with school it is important to have the drive to want to improve. I thank gymnastics for the lessons it taught me that were so far beyond just learning skills.