Life for Olympic Swimmers and All of Us – Pain and Persistence
By Charles Hartley, Guest Contributor
Here in America, we value persistence. If someone gets knocked around, rejected by a friend, fired from a job, loses a swimming race, we want to see that person come back, keep trying, be resilient, and fine-tune their craft. That’s all there is, really, trying and trying again, working to get better no matter what regardless of how many times you write something that no one reads.
Obviously they haven’t been good enough. Accept the message and appreciate the candor and fierce competition. Get better. Don’t whine. Write more. No matter the reaction, do it again. Improve. It might work; maybe it won’t. You can’t control everything. The beauty of life is you can control your effort. Do that.
I am thinking about this mentality as I contemplate what’s going through the minds of those 50 or so young people on the U.S. Olympic swimming team now training in Europe. In these last few days before they head to Paris to compete for the United States, they’re going to practice, do what coaches tell them, push their bodies to painful places. They know they must to be in top shape to perform as well as they can, and that’s all we’re asking of any of them, to prepare well, diligently, and then go perform. A lifetime of sacrifice being swimmers will culminate in a one-week crescendo in Europe.
I love these swimmers even though I know none of them. I love them for spending so much of their young lives dedicated to becoming great at swimming. Not for the money because there may not be that; just for the purity of swimming faster than anyone else in the world or the best they are capable of.
They probably don’t think this way but they’re inspirations for all of us to do our best in whatever our chosen crafts are. We see them race and we know the time spent preparing for those few seconds or minutes in the pool is astronomical. We watch them race, then wake up the next morning juiced to give our best effort at work or being a parent.
Being great at what you do takes laser focus. You must go back to the practice facility day after day no matter how you feel when others are going out having fun. Excuses aren’t acceptable.
To be great, you can’t take shortcuts. You have to spend the extra time alone with no one to cheer you on and you just get in the pool, put your head underwater, and can’t talk with anyone and just put in the effort for what seems like endlessness, a task without a finish line. Infinity in water.
Just practice. You and the pool, like close but too-familiar friends, doing what you have to do, hundreds upon thousands of laps, monotony always a thought away.
I am here tonight not because I really want to be. I would rather be lying on a couch. But decades ago I made a commitment to practice writing constantly, just like the swimmers. I’m not saying I’m as tough or dedicated as they are because I know I am not. But I do understand that repetition teaches you how to write sentences with more precision and flow and hopefully, sometimes, fresh insights in the same way sprinting in a pool helps you go faster if you do it enough times.
Tonight I am going to watch one of America’s greatest believers in the power of repetition, Caitlin Clark. She practices shooting a basketball now much more than almost anyone. For those efforts she became the leading scorer in college basketball history. A few weeks ago she received news she was not selected for the women’s U.S. Olympic Team. The setback had to be one of, if not the, first time she was told she wasn’t good enough to be on a team. Upon hearing the news she texted her coach “they woke a monster.”
Monster mentalities make champions. Those who won’t be stopped.
Since then she’s been on a tear as I knew she would be. Fine, she said, you don’t think I’m good enough. I’ll practice more. She has. It’s paid off. This week she’s been playing spectacular basketball. She’s improved.
The swimmers in Europe are like Caitlin. They’re among the best because of their willingness to practice more than virtually everyone else. There are few if any swimmers they grew up with who became as devoted to practice as these Olympians have. They are the select few. Pursuers of perfection.
In America we are into people earning what they receive. We don’t give people rewards who don’t earn them, and it’s one of the best things about this country. We shower our praise on the ones who work hard, who sacrifice, who tough things out, who endure the most pain.
I can’t think of anything more inspiring to think about right now than those swimmers being who they are, waking up in the mornings and going through absolutely grueling training sessions, maybe thinking they can’t wait until all the practices are over when they can sit around after the Olympics and not have to go to swim practice, move on to the next phases of their lives.
I would tell them the best part of achieving greatness is the practice required to get there. I would tell them practicing their crafts is the most fulfilling part of life, not the awards and medals. I would tell them for the rest of their lives they will come to understand this truth in a deeper way than they do now, and when that happens it will make them feel good.
