This is why I train

Earning my Black Belt, achieving that goal is so important to me. It will be something that I have accomplished. It won't be just another empty, shallow, broken dream that became a nice thought accompanied by the phrase, "What if?"

This new dream (outside of getting my BB), this new goal is so fragile. Like a bubble. And I'm afraid it's going to pop. Bubbles pop so easily and are lost forever. True, there are more bubbles, just like there are more dreams, but it's still, it's hard and painful losing a dream.

I don't want to let go of it. I want to see this other dream become a reality. I was talking to my dad earlier and I snapped at him because he was asking a legit question about how this goal is going to work out. I was wrong to do that, I know. Especially because he meant well. But I realized something-I'm afraid. I'm afraid of losing another dream, of another goal becoming just that-a dream/goal and nothing more. No flesh and blood, so to say, to those dreams.

This is why I'm working so hard on getting this belt. Yeah, to someone else, it's just an over sized belt with my name on it. But to me, it's so much more. It's finally achieving a goal. It's victory. It's accomplishment. It's a dream that became a reality. And it will mean that I can do anything else I want.

This is why I put every fiber of my being into it. This is why I will not give up. This is why I put up with the pain. I will win. I want to taste victory. I can't lose. I can't. And I won't.

I found something, and I want to share it with you.

"We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed. We are perplexed but not given to despair. We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed...That is why we never give up...our spirits are being renewed every day. For our present troubles are small and won't last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don't look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever!"