What drives me

43 followers

Updated 7 years ago

So this is my first update here, I have been here for around 2 months now. I discovered wealthy affiliate and am really excited.

I'd been researching how to establish passive income streams and most required investments, which are great but as a 20 year old student athlete I have lots of expenses and very little savings left to invest. My sport is the hammer throw, which is one of the 8 field events in the sport of "track and field". For those of you that don't know it, which is likely many, it's a 7.26 kg (16lb) metal ball at the end of a chain that you pick up, spin around, and try to throw as far as possible. World class hammer throwers can throw over 80m. If you're interested, check out a great compilation of some of the best athletes of all time here.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwcunU...

Hammer is the sport I love. I feel in complete control and powerful while I practice and compete. I love the honesty of the sport (ignoring the obvious doping issues) there's no judges or points or fouls. You throw, you measure. Farthest wins. Simple as that. I love the grace and fluidity that the olympians achieve, that I am getting closer and closer with each practice.

Now, while hammer throw is one of the oldest olympic sports, it is one of the least well known and popular. I don't care about being famous or anything, I just need to be the best I can be, hopefully one day the best of the world. This lack of popularity, however, makes it extremely hard to do so.

Only the top few in the world make a living. Most of these are european countries, where the popularity is higher, so they get more funding while young. I was a back to back provincial high school champion, the u-20 Canadian Champion, and 5th best all time in Canada for u-20s. I am currently u-23 Canadian champion at just 20*.

All of that and I received $1000 in one time scholarships going into university. With those stats, in football, soccer, lacrosse, baseball... you name it, pretty much any other sport, I would have been a full ride, allowing me to focus on sport.

I received around $1500 the last two years from my province. And have received $0 from Canada for my efforts and to continue my development.

If I didn't have to, I wouldn't care about money, and focus on working towards my goals, but unfortunately in this world I can't. So this last summer I had to work. Lots. To pay for trips and school and day to day expenses. It decreased my training time by over 40%. I improved less than half of what I did the previous years.

I can't become who I know I can be, having to work, physically draining and long hours. So I needed a way out.

I might just have found it.

So far I haven't made anything with wealthy affiliate, but it is taking me in the right direction. I do believe that it can work, seeing all the success stories on here, I hope to one day be one of them. I am prepared to put in work for a year or more even with no monetary results, because all I need is $500 per month and I can get 90%+ of my training hours back.

That is my goal, and that is why I am driven to achieve it.

What are everyone else's drives? I would love to hear your stories.