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Jack of all trades, master of none

 


“Sometimes we strive so hard for perfection that we forget that imperfection is happiness.”

At a very young age, my parents signed me up for ice skating. They invested lots of money over the years, on skates, outfits, coaches, private lessons, and competitions, and I of course invested lots of time into improving my skills. Throughout my childhood and teenage years, you could find me at the ice rink most days, trying to prepare for my next test, competition or show. Now, I was a decent skater, but realistically, I wasn’t on a path to the Olympics.

Once I went off to university, some difficult choices needed to be made, and for some reason, I decided to quit skating and invest more time in my education and career, as well as playing soccer during the summers. For several years after college, soccer became my main sport. Especially when I first moved to Dubai; I played indoor, outdoor, 7 aside, 11 aside, womens leagues and mixed leagues. Some weeks, I was playing 6 consecutive nights, and as one can imagine, seeing as I was playing so much, of course, I improved alot. But, once again, I wasn’t in any position to be aiming for the World Cup.

Towards the end of my first stint in Dubai and throughout my first year living in Vietnam, I suddenly became interested in long distance running. It all started with the goal of running a marathon on one New Years Eve, which then of course turned into running multiple types of races in various destinations. My long legs were good for running, and with consistent training, I saw lots of improvement with my times, but, I knew that I was never going to be winning a marathon.

While living in Vietnam, I eventually developed a great passion for CrossFit. I enjoyed the challenge of learning new skills and even more, I absolutely loved feeling strong. Just like with anything else we take on, in the beginning I saw alot of rapid progress, which was motivating, but eventually hitting PBs became more and more difficult. Additionally, after returning to Dubai, I quickly became aware of the fact that competing in South East Asia was quite different than competing in and around the UAE; the level of athletes I am surrounded by here is at a whole other level.

In addition to ice skating, soccer, running and CrossFit, I have enjoyed trying a large variety of other sports and activities, such as dancing and wakeboarding. Admittedly, I am athletically inclined, but I have never been anywhere close to competing at the highest levels with anything I have taken on. 

 

For a long time, my perfectionism and my competitive nature made me believe that I was just not good enough, however, I know deep down that to be “the best” at something, it often requires you to make many sacrifices. For some, making the sacrifces is worth it, and to others, like me, it’s just not. 

Many quotes floating out on the web will make you think that being average is somewhat of an issue and that we should always be striving to be outstanding; but why? What does average even mean? What does outstanding even look like? Surely, only a selective few can make it to the top and be outstanding…does that mean the rest of us are average? 

I’ll likely never make it to the Olympics, the World Cup or the CrossFit Games, as an athlete that is, but that’s absolutely ok. I am much happier doing lots of different things ‘imperfectly’, and I am proud of the effort I put into anyhing and everything I try.


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