my personal essay |
by Noah Cruz
my 500 word essayBasketball is my passion, basketball is my escape when times get tough. The game of basketball is so important to me, take away basketball you will take away my passion. I remember when I first played basketball, I’ve never even shot the ball before, I was with friends at the park and I asked for the ball and I just pulled up and shot. The feeling…it felt right when I released it from my hands. It felt good when I made that shot, I felt like I was a “somebody”. From that day I was obsessed with basketball. One thing I learned is to get better any sport you have to play somebody better than you. The first couple times I tried that I was very frustrated and wanted to quit. But there was something in me that didn’t let me. I’ve been told many times that I’m not good enough, that I’m not quick enough, I’m not fast enough. I used all negativity directed towards me and I used it as my motivation to get better. Like Kobe Bryant…he’s old and not like he was like that 2009. But he blocks out all negativity and he works hard to get better because he loves the game of basketball. Every morning I do as many pushups as I can then I do 100 sit-ups and then if I can I ride my bike to a local elementary school and play some basketball. When I get there the first thing I do after I stretch is lace up. As I lace up I have mental images in my head about which shot I’m going to take first. That’s very important…..the first shot when I step onto the court is my confidence for the rest of the time I’m on the court. Confidence to me is one of the keys to being a good athlete and if you don’t have confidence then you aren’t passionate about that sport you’re playing. I know that because a while back I played football. I played for 4 years and I never had confidence on any other of our games. I was the smallest on the field but had the biggest heart, but I was never passionate about playing. The only reason I kept re-joining is because I was peer pressured into doing it, and once I start something I never quit! No matter how hard it gets, that’s just how I do things. So when I started playing basketball my confidence started to grow tremendously, not to a point where I’m cocky. I had my eyes on trying out for the freshmen basketball team. I tried my hardest and but it wasn’t good enough, I didn’t make it. I wasn’t bitter or sad I just said to myself “I need to work harder, I have to want it more than the person next to me”. I congratulated my one of my good friend, Noah Garcia. I told him “good job man you deserved it”. Noah had beaten me for one of the spots on the team. To be honest I was afraid to fail and look what happened I did fail! In the words of Kobe Bryant “if you’re afraid to fail, you’re probably going to fail”.
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