A lesson every gymnast should learn...

In August of 2012, Savannah Scherling shared the story of her gymnastics career with everyone on this blog. (Click here to read it.) After dealing with ongoing injuries and having several surgeries, Savannah has retired from gymnastics, but she has learned an important lesson that she will take with her for the rest of her life. There is more to gymnastics then winning medals and learning the trickiest skills, gymnastics can teach you life lessons too. Below is something that Savannah wrote about what she has learned from gymnastics and I wanted to share it with all of you.

Savannah with 2004 Olympians Courtney Kupets and Courtney McCool

If I could only tell you one thing I've learned from gymnastics in the past ten years, I wouldn't tell you why it’s important to give it your all everyday. I wouldn't tell you why you should always listen to your coach or why you should never miss practice. I've learned to let go of everything. Winning a few meets, or even JO Nationals, doesn't make you a better person. It makes you an athlete with more titles to add to your collection. It doesn't make you more important than the athlete who took second, or even the girl who took thirty-sixth. The most valuable thing I've learned from gymnastics is that it’s only the first chapter of my life. It’s true for any athlete competing in a sport similar to gymnastics. Your body can’t hold on forever and eventually you won’t be able to do it anymore. It may seem like the end of the world, but you have the rest of your life ahead of you. I've realized that it’s important to accept what the sport has given you for so long. The day you’re forced to give up the sport may be when you’re twelve. You might make it until you’re sixteen. If you’re really lucky, you’ll be able to train into your early twenties. The quicker you embrace what you've gained from being apart of this sport, the quicker you’ll move on. There’s no point in sitting in the past. As long as you remember, nothing is ever really gone. You can hold onto the memories forever. Eventually, you’ll lose the sport, but you won’t lose what you gained from the sport. Most athletes can agree that their sport has changed their life. At the same time, some people get way too caught up in winning. A young gymnast isn't going to be more successful ten years down the road just because of victories. While it may be hard to comprehend, none of it will matter. It won’t matter where you trained, what scores you got, or even how many meets you won. When you’re interviewing for a job in your late twenties, they’re not going to care how many times you qualified to regionals. They’re going to look at the person you are, the education you received, and how you applied it to your life. Giving up a sport that you've been apart of for your entire life is extremely hard. It may be the hardest thing you've done thus far or it might be the hardest thing you’ll ever do. You have to accept that there’s always new opportunity out there. Whether your career ended due to your body being done, or even your heart, you’ll move on. Speaking for myself, I’ve learned that being injured was the best possible thing that could’ve happened to me. After two ankle surgeries and finally having to retire from gymnastics, I’ve gained so many things that I’ll carry with myself for the rest of my life. I now know how to look at and situation from all aspects. You can let an injury define yourself, bring you down, or you can embrace it as a part of you. Sometimes you’ll defeat the injury, other times you won’t be able to. The person that I’ve become over the past few years means more to me than winning ever could. I think I’ll be more successful in the end because I’ve learned to accept when you’ve had enough of something. By being put in gymnastics as a little kid, you’re going to have some success, but you’re also going to have those days when nothing is going right. If you can look past the imperfections in your beam routine, that’s success. Some people say that you’re only as good as you’re last competition. I say that you’re as good as you let yourself be on any given day. When you walk into the gym for practice, you’ve already decided what kind of day you’re going to have. It might not be easy to see, but deep in your heart you know whether you want to be there or not. If you truly don’t want to be there, it’s time to let go. This sport isn’t always about having the highest all around or having the most colleges after you. Some athletes are in the sport for the right reasons, because they love gymnastics. Other athletes do it because they want the titles, the recognition, or the awards. With gymnastics being a sport typically participated in by young people, it will eventually catch up to the athletes doing it for the wrong reasons. Sometimes it’s not fair, the most deserving athlete may be sidelined or sick. It’s part of the sport, but at the end of the day, the person you are means so much more and I can honestly say that I’ve become a better person since being injured.

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