I have beaten odds to get where I am today.
I have felt some pain every time I have walked another step forward, yet having taken even one step back, I have known that regression and giving up were not options for me. I have felt the emptiness of separation as I have moved in the wrong direction.
I have learned the arts of persistence, tenacity, and dedication. I know how it feels to watch my world and dreams shatter to a million pieces at my feet. I know what it is to run until there is nothing left inside of me, and then run some more.
I know how it feels to be loved, and I know how it feels when that loves grows hard and cold.
I know how to be happy. I know how to smile and spread joy into the lives of others with that smile.
I have learned that one conversation can make or break a fragile mind and heart, and thus I have learned to choose my words carefully.
I know that enthusiasm is the key to everything and yet I know how it feels to completely lack enthusiasm.
I have learned that winning is not everything, but sometimes it feels like it is the most important thing. I have learned that other color ribbons only prove to make that blue one that much sweeter. I know that my chief competitor is myself.
I know that sometimes my best isn't good enough for others and that people can be cruel. I know that sometimes I get frustrated with myself, especially when others are frustrated with me.
I know how it feels to have something mean so much to me that it IS me. I have experienced wrath, outrage and fury, but have still made it through the storm as a survivor.
I know what it is to love. I know how to spread joy and how to extract it from even the darkest situations.
I know what hope is, and I rely on it as my last refuge. I know that darkness must exist if only to make those tiny bits of light seem that much brighter,
I know that success is self-made, and that luck is relative term.
I know that I am strong.
I know that miracles do exist, angels do find us in our hour of need, and there is always something behind me, pushing me forward.
I believe in myself at all times, even when I think that I don't and even when I feel like no one else does.
I know how it feels to be lost. I also know what it feels like to be picked out of a crowd. What it is like to be the winner, and how it feels when, for one moment, you are the star of the show.
Above all, though, I know that all of this has made me ME.
I know that being a winner is not about winning whatever race faces me in the moment. I recognize I am winning by pushing myself everyday and by waking up each morning feeling blessed by the day that lies ahead of me. Through this I am winning in the most important race ever, the race I entered at birth--the race we call life.
Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize.
-1 Corinthians 9:24.
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