Being Pushed

I'm a high school swim coach and I love it.  I don't know if they love me though.  I think some of them think I ride them too much and push them too much.  After all they are just teenagers. But I'm glad my swim coach didn't look at me as just another swimmer.  She pushed me and I accomplished some amazing things in my swim career and I regret not swimming in college like I could have.  I'm probably not making sense right now but basically what I'm saying is I'm a tough coach, I know that.  I don't know if my swimmers understand why I'm a tough coach though.  I don't know if any of my swimmers read this, they probably don't, but I wish somehow they would read this post.

I'm reading a book right now called "The Last Lecture" by Randy Pausch.  It's a true story of Randy, the author, who is diagnosed with Pancreatic cancer and he gives his last lecture at a year long lecture series at UPenn.  He decides that his topic is "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams".  One of his childhood dreams is to play in the NFL.  He never reached this dream but he talks about his football coach that made an impact on his life because he pushed him.  He says in his book:

    Coach Graham used to ride me hard.  I remember one practice in particular.  "You're doing it all wrong, Pausch.  Go back! Do it again!" I tried to do what he wanted.  It wasn't enough.  "You owe me, Pausch!  You're doing push-ups after practice."
    When I was finally dismissed, one of the assistant coaches came over to reassure me. "Coach Graham rode you pretty hard, didn't he?" he said. 
    I could barely muster a "yeah". 
    "That's a good thing," the assistant told me.  "When you're screwing up and nobody says anything to you anymore, that means they've given up on you." 
    That lesson stuck with me my whole life.  When you see yourself doing something badly and nobody's bothering to tell you anymore, that's a bad place to be.  You may not want to hear it, but your critics are often the ones telling you they still love you and care about you, and want to make you better.

I have a lot of swimmers that I know get upset with me because I continue to critique and sometimes I can get on their case sometimes because I don't think they're living up to their potential.  But that's why I do it, because I care about them and I want them to succeed to their greatest potential and because I can see what they can become even if they can't.  I hope they someday realize that's why I do it.  I know some won't, but many will and that will make it all worth it.  I'm grateful for my swim coach, Shari Skablund, for never giving up on me and for pushing me to the point I was mad at her sometimes!  But it made me part of the person I am today because I worked hard and was pushed harder.  I hope she considers it worth it still for pushing me and putting up with me being a whiney teenager more times than not!  I consider her one of my biggest role models and she's family to me. 

So to sum this all up, I hope my swimmers know that I'm hard on them sometimes and push them harder than they think they can go because I care about them and I want them to succeed.  The harder they work the greater they'll succeed.  They know that but sometimes being a teenager its hard to remember that with all the other things going on in their teenage life.  I wish someone would have told me this when I was a teenager.  I would have listened to my coaches even more.