Holding On

My roughened, sweat slippery hands gripped the wooden, smooth, chalk-stained bar as though my life depended on it. My legs were in a V-shape, stretched 90 degrees before me. They were shaking so much they were tremors before an 8.0 magnitude earthquake.

My teammates giggled at my legs antics while my coach said in a stern voice, "Hold them up, or drop down." I squinted my eyes closed, trying with all my might to break my old record of 1 minute 20 seconds. Finally my slick hands, and wiggly legs couldn't take it any longer. I let go and with a "poof", collapsed on the soft, thick, blue foam mat beneath me.

"Good job Sherri! 1 minute 23 seconds! Go get some water!"

I grinned sheepishly as my teammates gave me praises and high fives while I limped off to the water fountain oasis on the other side of the gym.

Hours upon hours spent doing pull-ups, sit-ups, crunches, splits, squats, running, stretching, back bends, jumps, turns, penny-pinchers, super-man and hollow holds--molding myself into a pretzel and yanking muscles I never knew existed.

I never really thought much about the importance of all our many strength-building exercises. For most of the 10 years I did gymnastics, I only saw it as the torture time of practice, just another part of our jam-packed three hours of work outs.

Today I was thinking back to gymnastics toning and the groaning and pain and soreness which were the only tangible results I saw of our strengthening. We would always try to barter with the coach to skip out on one or two exercises because "Wahh wahhh..we worked so hard today!" or hope that by working slower on our routines, "Oops! There is no time left for strengthening! Save it for next time!" Surprisingly, our ploys hardly ever succeeded.

But without those exercises, I never would have had the power in my arms, stomach, or back to successfully do a round-off back handspring, or be able to pull myself up in a kip on the bars, or spread my legs enough to do a split leap on the beam, or push my arms off the vault to do a front handspring. Instead, I would have always fallen on my face or butt because I wasn't strong enough--and never would have gotten better.

Im at a place in my life in which I don't feel like Im doing what fits my passions, or what I assume I was "created" to do. I don't see the point in it. I whine about the monotony of it, get frustrated, impatient, and just want to give up. But Im starting to see how perhaps at this moment my Coach is pushing me and training me so I will have my skills honed--prepared fully for whatever is next.

I don't know what is next, but for now, I will keep my eyes fixed on my Trainer and keep going while my hands are slipping, and my legs are becoming noodles, because if I keep hanging on, I will soon be able to collapse, and rest because I have gained what I need for the next task before me.