The close of the 2016-2017 school year is coming rapidly. What you have to look forward to the next few weeks are end-of-the-year trips, semester exams and friends graduating. I hear several disgruntled voices in the hallway expressing how school should just be over. I have to admit, the teachers at one point or another have had those exact thoughts, but for different reasons.

It is funny now being on the other side in the school realm. As a former student, I understand the ongoing struggle of wanting not to be confined to the classroom, or listening to another teacher talk about plasma or algebra equations, or researching and writing a final book report.

It seems mundane and insensitive of teachers to expect you to want to listen, write or pay attention when the sun is shining through the windows, family vacations are around the corner and summer camps are in full swing. It is easy to be distracted. I know it is easy to give in to laziness and give up productivity and effort.

I get it. But now I know what I wish I would have told my high school self six or seven years ago.

Don’t quit.

Have you ever started a really hard exercise routine and wondered if you were going to make it in the last five minutes? I sure have. You are breathing hard. Your legs are cramping. The lungs you thought were working properly are wanting to climb right out of your chest. Your heart is beating faster than you thought was humanly possible. Your mind screams; “Give UP! You just can’t do it!”

You have a choice to make. You either push through, you work hard, you finish strong or you give up, you choose laziness and you never finish.

I have had moments in exercise routines where the regiment I chose gets tough. The burning in my throat is enough to make me stop and not finish. The shaking of my muscles causes me to drop the weight and give up. When I don’t finish, no matter how ugly it looks, I miss out on an opportunity to transform my body and to beat another excuse of “I just can’t.”

If you only missed one exercise does it really make a difference? My answer is yes. Why?

One missed exercise becomes two... then three... then four. Soon exercise will become nonexistent and you will ask yourself, how did I get this far? Because you accepted in your brain that one time that you just couldn’t do it. You opened yourself up to the fire brigade of excuses. In those moments, you saw failure as an escape route, not a perilous path.

The truth is, in order to build muscle, endurance, strength, you must be consistent, disciplined and committed to your training and diet if you want to see results.

No one else can just simply give you the results you want. Who wants that status anyway? Would you like to be known as the quitter, the cheater? No. You work hard. You beat your body and your mind to complete the work before you, the task ahead of you. Do it with diligence. You feed your mind with “I can” instead of “I won’t or can’t”.

Granted, some of you are saying that this should have been published at the beginning of the year to provide a sort of “ra ra” speech, an anthem you could speak to yourself when the times got rough. Don’t quit. Keep being consistent, disciplined and committed.

Whether posted earlier or in this case, now, I think we all need to realize the implications of quitting as it pertains to the close of this school year.

In the most serious teacher, friend, cheerleader voice that I can muster, I say, “Don’t quit.”

You may not see the results and fruits of your labors right now, but please don’t quit. The decision to fight the summeritis until it is time to fully engage in all of those summer ventures builds a sort of strength and discipline that will help you in future years no matter if you pursue university or head straight into the workforce.

Each stage of life has its own battles. What you do to push through each season matters. When you determine to succeed over just getting by, you are building your endurance, your “mental” muscle so to speak. It WILL hurt. It will be painful at times. Push forward.

The end of the school year signals the beginning of the summer. It is a time of adventure, change and fun. All VERY good things and I am a strong supporter of such activities.

But don’t give up and quit. Work for your last “A” of the year, continue to invest in friendships and take the opportunity to ask questions of your teachers. You are not promised tomorrow. You never will be. So live in light of today. Do all you can, with all of your might for the glory of God. Be imitators of Him. Walk in a manner worthy of Him so that when that final bell rings, you don’t have to look back and wonder what you missed out on. Instead, look forward to what lies ahead because, student, you finished well.