Musings in KIN212

Sport psychology.

You’d think it would be an interesting class, right? Oh, how I wish it was! Every Tuesday and Thursday, I waste an hour and fifteen minutes sitting in a half empty classroom and not paying attention. I know, I know; that’s SO not me! But when the professor (who shall remain nameless) makes it clear that he hates teaching the class, it’s really hard to care about it. I mean, if he doesn’t have the decency to care even a little bit, then why should I? And going to class is COMPLETELY pointless. Question banks for the tests get passed down from semester to semester; study the questions and you’re good to go. The answers are all in the textbook, which, by the way, is completely different from the PowerPoints he uses to teach the class. If you want them (for some bizarre reason), all the PowerPoints are on Blackboard, so there’s no reason to take notes during class. And, to top it off, he doesn’t take attendance, except on the days where so few people show up that being there gives you extra credit. Yes, I’m serious.

So basically, you don’t need to go to class to do well. But, me being me, I go to class. I sit there and don’t really pay attention, but I go. And I’ve gotten extra credit for it at least three times. ;)

But something shocking happened during one class: we learned something that I found to be extremely interesting.

*Pauses while you gasp.*

Believe me, I was shocked. I think I sat there for a solid minute wondering if I really just got something out of sport psych.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give to you: the Pygmalion effect, AKA the self-fulfilling prophecy.

No, not like Harry Potter’s prophecy, guys. That one was fulfilled because Voldemort is an idiot.

In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Pygmalion was a sculptor who, after seeing sisters deny Venus’s divinity and be “reduced” to prostituting themselves, decided he “was not interested in women.” He carved a woman out of ivory, and found it to be so realistic and beautiful that he fell in love with it. He desperately wanted it to become real, and Venus took pity on him and granted his wish.

Hence, the self-fulfilling prophecy: he wanted it so badly that it happened. In another respect, people with low expectations perform poorly, and people with high expectations succeed accordingly.

Now, I’m not the type of person to believe in stuff like this. I don’t believe in love at first sight, nor god, miracles, heaven, or Santa Claus (though the jury’s still out on the Chanukah Armadillo.) But honestly, I think the Pygmalion effect might be my one exception. It sounds completely ridiculous, like one of those things that we’d all love to happen but don’t really expect it to (like love at first sight).

But it’s already happened to me. I wished and wanted myself onto Endurance, didn’t I?



I can think of no other explanation for how I ended up being picked. I mean, my audition tapes were good, but were they better than 10,000 others? Really? I highly doubt that. But I did have one thing over everybody else: nobody – NOBODY – wanted it more than I did.

And then it happened.

Sure, I didn’t win. But in the grand scheme of things, I came closer to winning than 10,000 other kids my age. Making it onto the show was a huge victory in itself, as was making it through the right to stay (in some respect – much love to the girls! <3), and getting onto a team. Things, uh, sort of went to hell from there, but nobody else that has ever been on the show can say they had the same experience as me. Four and a half years removed, I’m glad everything happened the way it did. It gave me an experience entirely my own, and made me a stronger person.

Ahem. Tangent over.

But back to what I was saying, I wanted to get on Endurance with a burning passion. It’s kind of the same as my USOC passion, just in a much more concentrated version; the Olympics stretch out for years and years, but my Endurance obsession was crammed into just about two. It was a very short, very wild ride.



Haha! Couldn’t resist! :D (Please, someone tell me you get it...)

Wow, could I be any more scatterbrained right now?

ANYWAY.

For Endurance, I wasn’t the strongest. I probably wasn’t the smartest. I wasn’t the tallest (or the shortest, so shut up! :P), or the prettiest, or the most outgoing… but I was the biggest fan. The producers and casting directors saw that in me, and picked me because of it.

For the USOC internship, I might not be the most qualified. I won’t be the oldest, nor the most experienced. But I can tell you right now, and with complete certainty, I want it more than anyone. Hopefully there’s the USOC equivalent of 3Ball Productions’ Mark Levine that’ll do the same as he did!

But I’m not content to sit around and let Venus or an equivalent higher power turn my proverbial statue into a woman. I’m going to work AND wish. That should cover all my bases, right? ;)