High School Sports

Image courtesy of Park City High School

Once you are in high school, things change. You start to have grow up as grades count, responsibilities multiply, and your future seems to constantly loom over you. But high school is also a chance to try out for things like sports teams. There are many sports that our high school has teams for; cross country, soccer, softball, baseball, track and field, football, swimming, tennis, golf, lacrosse, and more. These teams give us many new opportunities to show what we can do and connect with others. There are many good reasons to be attributed to one, or more, of these teams.

The first reason is to show off your work ethic. Being on a sports team, or multiple, for four years straight shows commitment, skill, and the ability to do hard work. Going to practices after school, five days a week, how many weeks depending on season length, for four years is impressive. Your resume will look even nicer with that on there. Plus, colleges LOVE you to have loads of extracurricular activities! (Because we, students, totally have time to belong to multiple clubs and teams after going to school for seven hours, and then doing the hours and hours of homework our classes give us. Well, we do have time, but only after giving up things like friends and sleep!) Seriously though, sports teams can look really good on records, speaking of records...

Like my segue? I know I did! Now, onto what I wanted to talk about. You don't even need to be super talented when you're starting a sport to succeed in it. With a high amount of practices, plus great coaches, you can get really good really fast. If you get good enough to set records, personal or statewide, that also looks good. It chiefly helps if you want to be on a college level team when you get older. Setting records in high school can also just be really cool :).

Last, and I think most important, is the teammanship (yes I made that all one word). Belonging to a team and having to work with that team gives and develops skills. Skills like how to work well with others, how to integrate yourself, and how to make, and keep, friendships. During the swim season, I gained so many incredible friends. Belonging to a team that work well together and care about each other is a great feeling. Mostly I loved the difference between the water and land. If we were at a meet, we competed against each other. In the next lane over your best friend in the world could be swimming, but you would still try and kick their butt. Then, after the race, you'd be congratulating each other. I liked this because it showed that we know how to work hard and that we value our individual goals, but also that we can value each other's goals too.

High school sports teams are pretty great. You gain skills you never would have alone, and you get a great sense of belonging. Just maybe don't try diving anytime soon...

Image courtesy of You Can Be Funny

Stress!!!

Image courtesy of Mindwerx

Now, as every high schooler knows, stress is a big part of our life. Juggling deadlines, projects, sports, clubs, and still trying to have time to be with family and friends is a full time job. Personally, I know a lot about these stressful times. Since this is such a common problem, I thought I would write  about how to handle and maybe even decrease this stress.

First, DO NOT PROCRASTINATE. I know it sounds appealing, but putting things off until tomorrow is not the answer (although I wish it was). Here's a little step by step on how to avoid procrastination:
1. First, find a comfy spot to do your homework. Grab a pillow or a blanket, maybe a snack, make yourself nice and snug. I've found that if I'm comfortable, I'm less bummed about doing what I need to get done.
2. Now, make a to do list. What I like to do is to go through my classes and write down what I need to do in all of the them, and when everything is due. The due dates help me plan on when I need to get everything done by (well, duh). But really, seeing the exact date of when something is due helps me.
3. Go down your to do list, completing everything in the order you wrote it. As you complete a task/assignment, cross it off. Keep going until everything is done. Congratulations! Now you can do whatever you want to do, as in sleep.
*A little tip from Natalie- take breaks! Just because you want to get everything done doesn't mean that you need to completely overload yourself with information. Every forty-five minutes or so, take a ten minute break. This has helped me a lot, and I think it will help you too.

Another way to decrease stress is to see if you can get assignments done early. In my H. English class, we have a weekly assignment called Vital Vocab. My teacher (hello Mr. Parker) has a page where we can find all the Vital Vocabs for the entire quarter. This has been awesome for me, because when I had some extra time, I got all of them done. This helped because I no longer had to worry about forgetting to do them or having to keep up with the deadlines. Getting something done early is an awesome way to avoid the stress it could have caused you.

I hope this helps you guys! Remember, stress and problems are temporary and can be avoided. High school may seem hard, but I know we all can get through it and succeed in it. Remember that your teachers, counselors, family, and friends are there for you whenever you need it. Don't forget to make memories, not just of stressful nights and long days, but of football games and sports teams and friends and good times.

Gif courtesy of Animations A2Z