As I've mentioned earlier, playing a sport is as much of a mental strain as a physical strain. You have to tell yourself and force yourself to go that extra distance and to just, I don't know, hit the ball a little harder. I know that everything hurts. I know that you get all out of breath. I know that sometimes you just feel like just sitting down and drinking water for about a week, but you can't. You have to push yourself.
Yesterday, I swear that my coach wanted to murder me with these laps. We had to run back and forth, and honestly, I can't run distance well, even though I do cross country. I literally felt like sitting in the middle of where we were running and just wait for someone to drag my tired body away. But that wasn't what I did.
No. Instead, I told myself that I was not going to cheat myself out of this exercise, that this is for the better, that I would get my rest and water later. So I kept going.
I wasn't able to go very fast. My muscles, especially my stubborn hamstring that always tightens, just didn't want to even move at that moment, but I made them move. I still finished up. When I did finish I wasn't able to distinguish between my sweat (hard work) and the rain... Yes, I pushed myself.
So, if I can do it, so can you. You just have to think about the rewards that you would get later. You just need to think that your water, your breath, your rest, is all waiting for you in the end. You just have to know that you WILL finish.
Okay. Inspiring speech for the day. Jeez, that was a lot of optimism. Soak it in, peeps! It doesn't happen often!
And like Dory from Finding Nemo said...
Just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming!
You can replace the "swimming" part with the sport you do. Like running. Or you could just say...
Just keep going, just keep going...