Where do you turn to when the world seems so overwhelmingly difficult? How do you keep the sanity alive when everything is falling apart? For me, I turn to my favorite thing to do in this world, playing basketball. To me, it's more than just a game, it's my soul, it makes me who I am. As the saying goes "it's not what you know it's who knows you." A lot of people know me for playing this game and it's a pretty great feeling.
I was about 9-years-old when I started to play basketball, and ironically I never cared about it before, it was all about football. You couldn't get me to play basketball back then. My parents let me play organizational basketball -- it was a done deal after that, I fell in love with the game like Mitch. From there on out I started investing a lot of time and energy into this sport, literally blood sweat and tears. I have always been the quiet type growing up, and so were the characteristics of my game. I'm not going to lie, I wasn't a standout player at first, it took a long time before I realized I was way better than a lot of people I played against, which in the long run hurt my chance for playing college.
I play this games because it's an emotional therapy, whenever times are tough and dark, and when I can't express my feelings into words I can do it on the court. There is nothing better than splashing three pointers in someone's face, or running the court because no one can beat you. I have never played this game for bragging rights. But I do play to prove people wrong.
I have heard everything from, "You suck," "You'll never go to college just relying on basketball," "You're not good enough," "You're only good enough for D3" I have heard everything in the books. When I finally did prove every single one of them wrong, it felt great! Somehow and someway I played every division college had to offer, and excelled greatly, but sometimes good things don't last. Not everyone have the best interest for you, so some setbacks for made for major comebacks.
Now where I'm at in life with basketball is at Wesley College. Last season I had to sit, due to MCL, LCL and maybe some other serious injury. This summer I have been working unconditionally to get healthy again. We all have something that will put us in our comfort zone, or we go to when times get dark and heavy on our hearts.
