Bonnie Jean Schaefer

What is a Champion?

The athlete in me defines a champion as a person or team who wins.  Who conquers the competition.  Who is the best.  At least that’s what I used to see.  Until I made the transition from athlete to coach and from jogger to marathoner.

What image comes to mind when you hear the word “champion?”

The athlete in me sees an Olympic gold medalist.  Or the winners of the World Series.  Or a state championship team. 
 
In other words, the athlete in me sees a person or team who wins and experiences that intoxicating feeling of conquering the competition.  Of being the best.

At least that’s what I used to see.  Until I made the transition from athlete to coach and from jogger to marathoner.

When I first started coaching high school softball, I saw a team of athletes that I wanted to turn into champions.  To me, that meant beating the competition.  Winning games.

But I had a problem.  I saw them as athletes, competitors who wanted to be pushed to their limits to win games.  So I pushed them.  And they resisted.  Because I didn’t take the time to figure out who they were as people.  I didn’t take the time to figure out what they wanted to accomplish that season.

It was a frustrating, miserable, losing season at the end of which I decided I never wanted to coach again. 

Those girls didn’t become champions because I didn’t understand what a champion really is.

I stayed away from coaching high school for two years.

In the meantime, I ran a marathon.

Deciding to run the marathon was difficult because I knew with my super slow Schaefer speed that I had no chance of winning.  None.  Why would I want to compete in something where the chances of me winning were zero?  It didn’t make sense to me to want to run.  Because I wanted to be a champion.  I wanted to win.

Then at the end of one of my training runs, it hit me.  I wasn’t competing against the other runners.  I was competing against me.  As long as I finished that marathon, I would beat me.  Because 26.2 miles was a longer distance than I had ever run before.  And because it was a dream of mine. 

Therefore, a champion is someone who pursues a dream or goal or objective–no matter how big or how small.  A champion is someone who focuses on the process of becoming a winner rather than actually winning.

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