When I was younger I was never
active. I wasn’t interested in sports. All I did was study hard and get good
grades. I was a great student but my self-esteem was very low. I was an
overweight child and I didn’t feel good about my body. A huge factor that played into my low
self-esteem was that I was constantly picked on and I had to fight bullies
because no one would stand up for me. By the time I was in my late high school
years things started turning around. Little by little, I started losing weight
and gaining muscle by weightlifting. Today I can say that I’m literate in
weightlifting.
It all started during my time as a 11th
grader. I felt that I needed to get in shape. I didn’t want to be the fat
kid in class anymore. Another drive was that I wanted more strength to be able
to defend myself against the students that got silly in the school. Both my
weight and how I was treated by some bad students at school lead me to weightlifting
but my role model was my father. My biggest influence was my father because his
arms were big and as hard as coconuts and I wanted arms like his. He always
told me I could get arms like him but I never chased it until high school. I
started lifting in 2006, but it was a learning process. There were mistakes I
made along the way, and there’s one I regret until this day.
Back then I used to go to the gym
with my cousins and my best friend. I had gotten used to bench pressing with
ease, however, I wasn’t used to doing a variety of lifts. One day we were doing
shoulder presses with dumbbells. I was new to the shoulder press. My cousin’s
older brother who is my half cousin was pushing us to work harder. He had just
gotten out of jail and came out thinking he was physical trainer. Well, he had
us doing 35lbs dumbbells. I wasn’t even used to picking up 20lbs and he pushed
me to go from 20lbs to 25lbs, 30lbs, and then 35lbs. When I got to lift up the
35lbs dumbbells I did about 3 reps. On the 3rd or 4th rep I lost control of the weight that was in
my left hand and my arm snapped back. I was in really bad pain, I dropped the
weights, stood up and I almost fainted. I sat down on the ground and handed my
best friend my car keys and told him to drive me hope since I wasn’t able to
drive back. I just sat on the ground for about two minutes waiting on the dizziness
to go away. I got up and left with my best friend.
By the time I turned 17 I was a
little bigger. I gained muscle but I wasn’t working on every part of my body.
For my graduation I got to see my father again after 3 years of not seeing him.
He wrote out a workout plan for me and told me that everything had to be worked
on and that I shouldn’t overlook anything. He also said that proper form and
controlled breathing is necessary. I
followed the workout plan for awhile and modified it as I learned new exercises
from videos and articles online.
My weightlifting literacy helps me understand
that success takes time. I remember that right after high school I would wanted
to do everything at once. When I was a student at CCRI I loaded my class
schedule but got poor grades. Today I just take my time with what I have to do
and try and do the best I can in every one of my courses and so far it has paid
off. Another thing that I learned from weightlifting that translates to school
is working hard on everything and not overlooking anything. This one is definitely
true to looking at a syllabus and not taking an assignment serious because it doesn’t
weigh as much as the others. Every assignment needs 100% just like when lifting
every muscle group needs to be given 100%.
From my weightlifting literacy I’ve also learned that I can’t measure
success by the achievements of others.
On my future as teacher I can say
that my weightlifting literacy will impact my expectations from the students. I
will know to get them ready before I challenge them with an assessment. I will
be sure to have realistic expectations. I will reflect on my progress and
modify what I must just like I do with my workouts. The number one thing about
my weightlifting literacy that will have an impact on my future as a teacher is
learning. I’m always looking for new things to learn and add to my workouts and
there’s always something new to learn in order to improve as a teacher and as
human being.
