I've been active in playing sports for the majority of my life, yet I never endured significant injuries. After years of playing contact sports such as tackle football and basketball, you'd think I would have been accustomed to common injuries like sprained ankles and sprained fingers. Surprisingly, I was that lucky kid who never faced the repercussions of injuries, and I was entirely naive to what they can do to an individual. At the age of 16, my mindset on this subject took a complete 180-degree turn.
It was the summer going into Junior year. I would be an upperclassman and a captain on my high school basketball team. Summer league for basketball had just started up, and seeing this as a new opportunity to establish my significance as a role player for my team, my confidence level rose. By the same token, arrogance came and a sense of entitlement developed. During one of our basketball summer league games, I made an abnormal movement on defense while I was trying to knock the ball out of the offensive player’s hands. The end result was a torn labrum in my left shoulder. I immediately knew something wasn’t right, so I rested the following week. Shortly after returning, I exacerbated my injury by tearing additional labrum cartilage. All it took was a split-second moment like this to dismantle my vanity. This was the first moment in my life that I was vulnerable to real adversity, and I had no clue what to do with it.
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Following this incident, my mentality toward academics, social life, and athletics withered. I always had an excuse, and I used my injury as a scapegoat for my frustration. I didn’t know it at the time, but this is one of the best things that ever happened to me because I was given a wake-up call. Over time, I grasped that this was a life lesson. It was clear that I was going to come across adversity my entire life, and if I quit because of an injury, then I was going to quit everything. Up until this point, my life was moving relatively smoothly, and now I was knocked off track. I accepted my situation and moved forward; moreover, I realized that I have to be grateful for every day and opportunity I am given. I was no longer self-absorbed, and I understood that other people would give anything to be in my prior position.
This obstacle rattled my morale, but most importantly, I learned to be persistent at times of failure and distress. I never allowed this circumstance to define my life, and it was clear that the process was more important than the product. If the product is just about me, I will never succeed.
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