Never Give Up — Even When All The Odds Are Against You | A Reflection Of Sorts
Simone Manuel — thank you for shaking every part of my somewhat unsteady being…
Like a lot of the world right now, I have the Olympic coverage on all day. When I’m working on something, I have it going on as noise in the background. In the morning, instead of drinking my Temple Coffee in silence while reading my iPad, I groggily sit on the couch, half asleep with the Olympics on. When I have a free moment throughout my day when I’m not at home, I reading about the Olympics on my phone. I, sometimes, watch the Olympics with my family and then we all go into separate rooms and watch it separately, but that’s a different story.
You can say, that the Rio Olympic Games are taking over my free time right now and judge me all you want — I don’t care. During the (summer and winter) Olympics, this is what I do.
Tonight was no different, but at the same time, it kind of was. I stood still as Simone Manuel started her 100m freestyle race, I didn’t know that she was the first African-American woman to receive a gold medal in swimming, I stood still because for some reason when any woman from Team USA is on my screen, I don’t move. I stand (or sit) in one position and just watch because for whatever reason it is, when female, American Olympians take center stage, so-to-speak, I have to watch them perform because something within me goes back to that high school version of me where everybody (including myself) said that I wouldn’t graduate from high school and then I did. A part of me goes back to that first day of college in 2010 where I told myself that I would never get out of Sacramento City College and then I did — well kind of, but not in the way that I will in the spring of 2018 at Orange Coast College.
And I froze even more when the commentator said that Simone Manuel tied for first place making her the first African-American woman to receive a gold medal. I stood frozen in one spot for more than five minutes and then some thoughts came to mind that I am sharing with you here.
Simone Manuel has shaken every part of my somewhat unsteady being. Just four months and four days older than my younger brother, and she has reminded me what persevering through those hard moments really means. Her even participating in the games in Rio means that she’s put in a lot of hours while I was still asleep — means that being a gold medal receiving olympian was probably a dream of hers — it made me think, how much am I willing to give up for my dream? It made me think, what am I doing right now to get to my dream? It made me think, what could I be doing better to actually achieve my dream? When I couldn’t initially answer those those questions, something in my somewhat unsteady foundation began to shake.
What did I learn tonight? Don’t let anyone ever tell me that I can’t do the impossible. Don’t let anyone tell me that my dreams are invalid. My very small beginnings will be very big successes with a lot of hard work and perseverance. And that I should never give up even when all the odds are against me.
Even if I’m the one saying that ‘it’s impossible,’ ‘my dreams are invalid compared to _____,’ ‘my small beginnings don’t matter,’ or ‘the odds are against me.’ Sometimes it’s you standing between yourself and your dream.
