Almost everyone can attest to the fact that sports are one of the essential parts of being in high school and being a high school student. Every Friday night in the fall you along with everyone else in your high school would be at the football field cheering on your classmates to beat the opposing team. In the winter it would be the same concept, but instead you are in the gym cheering on your basketballs teams whether it's girls or boys. Then moving onto the final season, spring where you would be in the stands at a baseball game or at my high school would be behind the left field grilling out or doing whatever the “Left Field Loonies do.”

The main point I am trying to get across is that in some way shape or form you were apart of sports in your high school career. In my personal sports career I was in soccer for my main sport (cross country for a year), basketball til 10th grade then nothing and my main focus was track in the spring. My love for track was uncontrollable, I would devote all of my time to the gym in the off-season. I was always either lifting, running or just eating healthy. I was consumed with the thought that my senior year of track had to be the best it had ever been. I was going to dedicate my mind, body and soul to the sport I loved unconditionally. Then the first day of practice hit and there were so many younger girls who were faster than me and more talented than I am or was ever at their age.

After that moment everything I had worked months on end for was slowing slipping through my fingers. The sport I loved unconditionally hadn’t loved me back for the first time in all of my track career, in my six years of sweat, blood and many tears. Then I started to learn a valuable lesson about how high school sports aren’t actually as important as everyone says they are. I finally realized I had been putting so much emphasis on how I had to be the best at Track, that I wasn't truly enjoying the sport that I loved more than anything.

That was a real wake up call for me, from that point on when I didn't do as well as I had hoped at track meets, I would try to reassure myself that this wouldn't matter in the big scheme of life. If I didn't get individually get into the top five or even ten places in my particular event I would just have to think to myself about how all of this won't matter ten years or even in one year down the road, so I should just enjoy the fact that I competed at such a high level. This doesn't mean I just gave up and half assed it for the rest of my season, no. This means I gave everything I had in the meets and practice, but I started to enjoy the little things more, I started to enjoy my teammates, I started to enjoy being a captain and helping them if they were struggling, I just started to enjoy and love the sport despite how I did at meets.

My advice to any younger athlete in high school is to enjoy the moment, enjoy the bus rides coming and going to meets or games, enjoy your teammates and enjoy when you do make a great catch or cross the finish line with a personal best! Because that right there, is what high school sports are all about, they are all about working your butt off to be the best you can be and even competing against the kids on your own squad to get that position you have been working toward. High school sports are supposed to be an incredible time, some might say they are the only good thing about high school!

I am telling you personally that you shouldn't put so much emphasis on your skill level in high school athletics because it's not going to matter ten years down the road so enjoy the moment! You may never get to represent your school in a sport ever again so have fun and make it count!