Realize That You Represent

By Katie Downing

 

            Every time you put on your school letter jacket or wrestling warm-ups in high school, you acknowledge the fact that you represent your team and your school.  When you put on a varsity warm-up or singlet, you also acknowledge that you have earned the right to represent your team in a varsity position.  Everyone should take the opportunity at one point or another in life to take this act one step further.  Everyone should take some time to think about who and what they represent, what that means to them, and the responsibilities that come with representing something.  As soon as you become a wrestler, it becomes even more important for you to take a look at what it means to represent, and to take seriously everything that you stand for. 

           

            First of all, you represent yourself.  When you consider how you represent yourself, you think about what kind of man or woman you want to be.  Representing yourself well is how you build your legacy.  When you consider your legacy, you think about what kind of impact you want to leave with people if they were never to see you again.  How do you treat other people?  What kind of work ethic do you have when it comes to getting it done in the classroom or on the mat?  Do you show respect to teachers, coaches, parents, etc.?  How seriously do you take your personal spirituality?  What do the choices you make say about you?  What kind of personal standard do you have for yourself?  These are only some of the aspects of your character to take into consideration when you actively begin to build your legacy. 

 

            Next, you must realize that you represent many things larger than yourself.  If you take your legacy seriously, then representing everything else should come easily.  It can be easy to forget everything or everyone you may represent.  You represent your family.  What does your family feel is important in a person?  If you do not agree with your family, or they do not hold you to a standard, then now is the chance for you to begin to build a legacy for your family.  You represent your school and wrestling team.  What do your team and coach expect of you?  How do they expect you to act in victory, defeat, in practice, and off of the mat?  What will other teams know about your team by the way you carry yourself?  Any time you travel for wrestling competition, you also represent your community.  If you compete nationally, you represent your whole state.  What do you want other people to know about where you’re from by the way you act?  Take a moment to think of what else you may represent, whether it’s a church, friends, the sport of wrestling itself, etc.?  There are some communities that love wrestling and truly celebrate the sport, but there are many places in this country that are not familiar with wrestling at all.  When people learn that you are a wrestler, they begin to form their opinion of wrestling just by what they know of you.  That can be a big responsibility.

 

            Ladies, the responsibility of representing your sport is even bigger for you.  If there are many people who do not know about wrestling, there are even more who know nothing of women’s wrestling.  In many places, the only thing a community knows of women’s wrestling is through one person.  If you are a woman wrestler, you may represent all of women’s wrestling for thousands of people who will never know any other female wrestler.  What do you want the people around you to know about our sport?  What kind of pride do you want to display about the sport through the way that you carry yourself?  If you are lucky enough to be a part of an entire team of women wrestlers, then your team represents the sport.  Every teammate is responsible for building the standard the team upholds.  There is one more thing for a woman wrestler to consider.  You are unique among women because you wrestle.  You can take pride in the character that the challenges of wrestling developed in you.  You are also unique among wrestlers because you are a woman.  Take pride in that as well.  One time one of the men on the national team told me that he admired the way that the women encourage and support each other even in practice.  Take a moment to consider all of the things that are unique to women’s wrestling, and celebrate those things.