Sliding your way to the finishing line!
Victoria Seiketso Sethibe | Thursday July 28, 2016 13:51
It could be anything from that overwhelming feeling you get while preparing for your examinations to falling down a few metres away from the finishing line during a race that means a lot to you. Hurdles somewhat always seem to intensify with things that matter the most to us, which is why resilience is always an important factor if winning is part of your plan.
Watching youth compete during sporting events is never a boring moment for me and athletics have always been one of my favourite.
Seeing your own get a medal is always such a pleasant experience. A big up for Karabo Sibanda for getting that bronze medal during the 2016 International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) U20 championships in Poland. That is commendable!
An important lesson from these IAAF competitions is that achieving your level best is without doubt a rewarding experience. It was worth every effort for Karabo to work consistently hard to achieve his level best and grab the bronze medal.
Sometimes people miss out on opportunities, not because they do not have what it takes to benefit from them, but simply because somewhere on way they felt discouraged. It can be easy to lose sight of your courage when all along you have perceived yourself as making progress and then suddenly you see and focus on others who seem to be doing much better than you.
Whenever you feel that way, you must always remember that silver and bronze medals are also up for grabs. The benefits that come with every medal are something to write home about.
Those who actively participate in competitions but do not get any medals also get to benefit in a whole lot of other unsung ways like gaining physical fitness and learning to work under pressure, skills that can also be translated to other life situations.
Seeing how others are doing also has added value. Still following the IAAF competitions, it was particularly fascinating to see the mental strength displayed by Kumari Taki, an athlete from Kenya when he fell on the ground and slid his way to the finishing line to grab the gold medal.
Clearly, from the look of things, Kumari’s aspiration or plan was to be on the lead by opening a wide gap between him and his competitors during the last lap of the competition and he consistently focused on working hard to achieve HIS plan.
From that, a lesson that could be learned is that in order to achieve a goal, consistent hard work is inevitable. If your goal is to ace those examinations, for instance, you need to be working consistently, working hard at that.
Most youth can relate to that since they go to school anyway. Setting goals is also a key part of everyone’s life and making plans to reach goals is also part of the whole process. A goal without a plan is just like going on a trip without knowing the route to your desired destination.
It is always interesting to see somebody jealously guarding against their dream. It was such an amazing feel to see Kumari fall down and give it his all to slide to the finishing line and not only win, but win a gold medal.
Without doubt, what worked for him was the way his legs blocked and delayed his biggest threat, before sliding to the finishing line, something that seemed like a well executed emergency plan. Talk about the last kicks of a winning horse!
You too can give it your all to jealously guard against your dream, even when your hurdles have gotten the better of you.