Lost opportunities

I missed a competition in gymnastics because I got ill. I was 5 or 6 years old and was looking forward to that competition. Primarily because of a beautiful blue and violet leotard with glitters, a uniform gymnastics suit which was given to every participant. 🤸🏾‍♀️

—Excuse me, is it your daughter? - a woman on a bus approached us, - I am a gymnastics coach in a sports school, we are looking for girls of your daughter’s age to form a team.

And this is how I found myself enrolled in trainings. It took quite a long time to get to this sports school by bus, but I really enjoyed my gymnastics trainings! I did fairly good in different categories - exercises on bars, splits, sprints. At home we had a wall-mounted ladder, dismountable bars, a tail rope so that I could train.🏅

But then one day after a check-up at a cardiologist’s a heart problem was diagnosed. As I found out not a long time ago it hadn’t been a big deal, almost norm at that age, but to my worried parents it was something big and they decided I needed to say bye to gymnastics. 😌

Later on I showed some interest in skating, and my mother and I went to a test training on a skating rink. The coach there instructed us later about the training and that we needed to buy new figure skates. ⛸️

—Are you sure you really want this? - my mom asked suspiciously about that skating training, - You know these new figure skates cost a lot of money, and you need to train regularly.

—I guess I do want, - I murmured hesitantly.

—And don’t forget about possible traumas - you could fall often, break an arm or a leg, fall on your back and hurt it. I kept quiet and started visualising.

—Besides, who will take you to these trainings? Grandma?She’s already going with every day to school and meeting you after classes. This will be too much for her, and we can’t do it, as we work.

—Well, maybe I don’t really like skating that much, - I replied as I sensed that my parents were not really supportive about that. 🥲

Overall, I didn’t go to any extra curricular activities. No sport, no art or music school. While my fellow pupils were engaged in different activities, I stayed at home, doing homework most of the time.

I often find myself lost in the labyrinthine corridors of “what ifs.” What if I had continued with gymnastics? Would I have twirled my way to regional or even national championships? Wearing that blue and violet leotard with glitters, would I have discovered a more resilient and disciplined version of myself? 🤔

And what about skating?If I had pushed through, skates and all, would I have found another kind of freedom, gliding across frozen surfaces, perfecting spins and jumps?💎

We are shaped by the opportunities we miss as well as by the ones we seize. And it’s almost poetic - our life, a tapestry of alternate possibilities, each thread representing a different path, a different story, a different ‘me.’ Had I committed to gymnastics or skating, it would not just have been about acquiring a new skill. It’s about the version of me that could have existed - a version instilled with different virtues, facing different struggles, celebrating different victories.🧐

As I now contemplate these winding roads of my past from the vantage point of my present, I realize that it’s never too late to change course. The ocean of life is vast, and it’s filled with countless opportunities - some missed, some seized, and many that still lie beneath the horizon, waiting for us to set sail.⛵️