some of you know, some of you don't, but i used to be a competitive gymnast. i started gymnastics when i was about 2 1/2 years old, after teaching myself how to do a forward roll while watching the World Championships on TV. after that, i lived and breathed gymnastics. a tape of the World Championships with my idol Kim Zmeskal was labeled "Kimi's Favorite Gymnastics Tape." i got asked to join my first team when i was 4 years old. when i was 5, i moved to World Olympic Gymnastics Academy (WOGA) where i spent the next 6 years of my life working my butt off with the dream of an Olympic medal. i had 2 mats, a beam, a chin up bar and a trampoline in my room. gymnastics was my identity. i was training Level 9, and in another few years those Olympic dreams might have come true. but i quit. because all the other girls on my team started homeschooling and i didn't want to. i didn't want to completely give up my life for Olympic dreams. because what if they stayed just that- dreams? i didn't want to take the risk.
last night i went to the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium and saw the US Women's Gymnastics team win the team final at the World Championships. it was so exciting, but i felt almost detached from it all. maybe because deep down i wanted so badly for it to be me on that podium. i looked at those girls, 6-7 years younger than me, and i saw a dream i'd never get. i googled USA Gymnastics tonight and one of the first images to come up was an iconic poster of Kim Zmeskal in a signature pose- a poster i had on my wall for years as a child, a poster i looked at every day and thought "someday, that's going to be me."
and it made me look back and wonder what might have happened if i hadn't quit. would i have been on that 2004 or 2008 Olympic team. the past 2 Olympic All-Around gold medalists (Carly Patterson and Nastia Liukin) were from my old gym, WOGA. could i have been with them? it's hard for me to say i regret quitting. because i quit gymnastics, i was able to reclaim my childhood and lead a relatively normal teenage life, i fell in love with dance and theatre, i had friends outside of gymnastics and enjoyed normal middle school and high school activities. i was able to go to USC and discover who i really am and rediscover a relationship with Jesus. i'm in Japan right now because of USC Cru. i wouldn't have had any of those experiences if i'd stayed in gymnastics. and i was still able to do high school gymnastics and became the first girl from my school to ever make the Texas National Team and compete at Nationals. i ended my career on a good note. making the National Team was one of the best moments of my life. but still... it's hard not to wonder, especially when i watch a huge gymnastics competition.
i seem to have this thing where because i enjoy many different things, i never really commit to one thing. i used to think that it made me unique, but i'm not sure if it's actually good. because i think it gives me an excuse to never really take a chance. never really give it my all. i could have been a great gymnast. but i quit. and watching Glee tonight, i realized i never really committed to theatre or dancing either. i didn't really quit those either, but i never put in as much effort as i could because i was doing 20 other different things. and now i'm in Japan, and i love it, and i know God has called me here, but it's hard not to see my friends in LA or New York living their dreams and not wish i was there too. but at the same time, i'm a bit afraid that if i was, would i be good enough?
isn't that what we're always wondering? am i good enough? what if i'm NOT good enough? thankfully we have a God whom we don't have to compete for, we don't have to try for, because He loves us already. He loves us even when we fall, when we fail, when we screw up. and that alone should make us good enough.
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