A Goal Can Make You FLY!

Goal-setting is crucial for creating progress in one's life, just as seeking out a challenge creates these such opportunities.

It has been a well-known fact of my lack-of-hip-function-body, that swimming butterfly is simply just not an option. In my 14 years post, I had little hope of ever being that "fly swimmer" that I once used to be and almost forgot about it entirely.

That is, until I needed a new hurdle in my swim journey.

After my meet in December, actually we hadn't even left Toronto before I consciously decided that I wanted to be able to swim fly in the next meet. So, it was decided and now the training had a clearer focus. I have been training with this goal in mind since, some days with great hope and encouragement, and others with the notion that I had completely lost my sanity in making such a pronounced statement for a goal.

Now, I realize that this may not seem like much of a goal or challenge to some, but to me it represents so much more. Being able to complete the fly opens my mind up to more confidence than I could have ever imagined before. Like literally being able to fly; this concept had always been so far from my reach, almost to the distance of Jupiter, I had no clear sight of it at all. However, putting that very idea in my frontal lobe and churning and yearning for it--even dreaming about it--I have found that all things can be possible.

On a daily basis, I attempt with great gusto to be the example of what could come from a little human effort. Getting up at 3AM makes sense when you think in this manner. BUT, for some reason, with all of my training day-in and day-out I hadn't gotten the guts to try a whole 50 fly (the exact length that I would need to complete for my meet in 2 weeks!) I am not sure if it was more about the risk of failure or the feeling of failure itself, but for whatever reason, it was far more powerful than actually trying.

I realized this yesterday as I returned to the pool for the second time that day--which has been my routine for the past month. Throughout my entire workout, this nagging sense of disappointment repeatedly piped in at every wall stating, "You've just got to TRY! You owe it to yourself"

So, I finished up my workout and yelled out a mental, "Ready? Set...GO!" and gave it that TRY.

And... I did it. It was slow, but strong and I am sure that there was a smile on my face the entire time. My body had known it all along. I was physically capable. I had trained over and over again and prepared my body for its challenge. Again, it was my own lack of self-confidence and pre-programmed doubt that had led me astray.

Today, I am so proud to say that I did it. And I will continue to do it. This milestone is slight and small in presence, but ever so impacting in the overall journey that I am on.