A 6 Year Story

Hey family!

I have a mix of life updates and inspirational perspective for you this week (well, the first week in a while).

I spent six years of my life in total commitment to signing to a team. 

I guarantee, I have spent more collective hours moving towards my goal of getting a scholarship to play for a team than most people have spent on anything. 

I woke up and worked towards it, when I wasn’t working towards it I was thinking about working towards it, and when I was asleep I dreamt about it. My entire being became a pursuit of this goal. 

I wanted nothing more than to experience what it would be like to sign the contract, get the gear, and get the photoshoot. I’ve pushed my mind, body, and soul to the brink of insanity all for the sake of pursuing my signing day. 

Anddddddd, well, I never got it. And although I did ultimately end up with some gear and on a roster, that’s pretty much the story. Until yesterday. 

Yesterday, I onboarded for my new personal training job at Leg1on Performance Training in Pittsburgh. 

I signed my contract, I got tons of gear, and I’m getting a photo and video shoot. I got exactly what I had always dreamed of, years after I let that dream go. 

This wasn’t signing with a team, no. 

But it was just as fulfilling (if not more) than I had ever hoped it to be. It felt better than anything I had spent years imagining. And yet, it looked drastically different than what I had spent so much of my life envisioning. 

I spent 6 years with tunnel vision, directing all of my attention, energy, and focus towards achieving my goal of signing with a team. But the downside of tunnel vision isn’t that we are focused on something, the downside of tunnel vision is that our view is limited to the tunnel. In other words, tunnel vision makes it incredibly hard to see beyond what you want, and almost impossible to let go of it. 

And in my tunnel, my endless pursuit to sign with a team, I couldn’t possibly see the many circumstances in my life redirecting me to my other passions and ultimately my purpose. There’s no way I could’ve been able to appreciate the way that this job will propel me forward in ways I can’t even wrap my head around, and allow me to both learn from and help others. 

I had to let go of my dream. But once I let go, it came back to me reshaped and repurposed for who I truly was and what I truly wanted out of life. 

The start of the new year is always a time to dream and embark on journeys towards new goals. But if there’s anyone else who’s had to let go of a dream recently, let me assure you:

The dream you’ve let go of isn’t dead. It’s being revamped and remodeled to better serve the person you’re becoming, to better fit what will be most true and beautiful in your life. Just know, it’ll make it’s way back.

Here's the quote of the week: 

"It is only when there is no goal and no rush that the human senses are fully open to receive the world."

-Alan Watts

Reflection Question: Are you maneuvering life with tunnel vision at the start of this new year to pursue goals? If so, how might this be impacting your ability to see things from another perspective and be open to things that may be better for you?