Weight lifting isn’t something that a person can just get good at overnight, and it also isn’t defined by a definite, “If you can lift a certain amount of pounds at this certain exercise then you are good.” Rather, it is something that requires time to develop and a person’s own personal standards to judge by.
Half way through my sophomore year of high school I transferred to Tacoma Baptist High School in Tacoma, Washington. I had never had a weight lifting elective available for me to take, and, coming from a family where my mother was a body builder and my dad was in the army and is now a fireman, I jumped at the opportunity to work out as they did. Mrs. Brown was my “trainer,” and every day during second period I found myself in the weight room, working out my muscles.
I am an athlete—a competitor, and as such, since there were more boys in the class than girls, I found myself working twice as hard around all of the guys, trying to prove to myself (and sure, maybe them, too) that I wasn’t “just a girl in the weight room who was just working out because it was a required elective.” I can attribute a lot of my character traits as having been learned from my mother, and a few of them definitely come out in the gym. My mom never outright had a conversation with me about not being a wimp and et cetera, but by her actions I grew to be somebody who does not like to take the easy way out.
My mother is strong. I’ve watched her be a single mom until I was eight, endure a year of separation from my new father when he was deployed to Iraq, work hard to provide for her family, support my dad’s mother financially, allow me to be able to do all of the things that I’ve ever wanted to do, and, of course, work out in the weight room (she was able to rep 165 pounds on bench once upon a time). Due to this, her and I both don’t like the typical excuses that most girls make “just because they are girls” and should not be expected to physically perform as well as a male in the weight room.
So, I worked hard. Every day was a different muscle workout. Some days were chest, other days I would work out my back, then legs, and so on and so forth in a continued cycle. We were required to fill out forms of the weight we did at what repetition for how long we did it every day to make sure that we did the work out for that day. Most of the girls in my class detested it; I welcomed the challenge (as did my partner, who I may have rubbed off on).
As aforementioned, you don’t get “good” at lifting weights overnight. It takes a long time for your muscles to build up for you to be able to move up in weight and reps. Eventually I got to the point where I could rep 125 pounds on the bench press, which was good “for a girl,” or so I was told. And yet, it wasn’t about being “good for a girl.” It was not about proving myself to the guys in my class or even about being strong. Rather, it was the determination and perseverance that I learned through the experience of lifting weights every day for 4 months straight that gave me the satisfaction.
I didn’t give up. I didn’t slow down when things got hard. And, most of all, I didn’t COMPLAIN. Rather, in the words of my mom, “I just sucked it up and did it.”
“Just suck it up,” my mom would say—but not in a coldhearted way, but in a way that expressed, “Don’t give into the pain, Cayla. Just finish what you started.”
And that’s exactly what I did.
Maybe that’s why I like the “Just Do It” Nike commercials so much, because it expresses what I think about when I am faced with a challenge. Don’t think about the obstacles in your way—don’t think about how much it hurts—don’t think about the pain—don’t complain—just do it.
A few months into the summer before my junior year of high school I ended up breaking my arm at the joint, thus rendering me unable to workout my junior year and most of my senior year; too, the summer before my freshman year of college (July 2011) I ended up breaking my other arm. Now, my arms make it difficult to work out because they constantly feel weird, click, and do other weird things. It got me down a little bit during my senior year of high school. I wasn’t working out as much, rather, just running and doing core and a few pushups here and there. But I missed the strengths in my arms—in being able to lift after all of that hard work that I had put into my body (you loose muscle a lot quicker than you gain it, I’ve found). Recently, though, the lessons of determination and perseverance that I learned my sophomore year of high school have returned. I am in the weight room every day for Track and Field, lifting, and I’ve found my muscle in my arms coming back—getting stronger.
I am determined to persevere.
I will just do it.
To God be the glory in all that I do.
