Yuna Kim is the first female skater to hit the grand slam in figure skating. She won the World Championships, the Four Continents Championships, the Grand Prix Final and the gold medal in the 2010 Winter Olympics. She broke the world record 11 times in 3 years and she holds the all-time records for both short program and freestyle totals. These are great accomplishments for twenty-three-year-old “Queen” Yuna. She is the best of the best.
Yuna Kim already stands on top with all the records. She is a figure skating queen known worldwide.
The female singles figure skating is also known as the beauty of the Winter Olympics. At Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics, the music selection Yuna made for the freestyle was Gershwin Piano Concerto. As soon as the music starts, Yuna began her routine as she broke the silence of the audience who anxiously awaited her performance. The commentators were at a loss for words during Yuna’s almost perfect performance when she showed off her precise movements and techniques. She captivated the world’s sports fans with her elegance on the ice. She effortlessly jumped into the air and made turns and gentle landings just like a swan.
Watching Queen Yuna, who receives fervent responses from so many audiences with her fancy title and gold medals, many people forget about the fact that she has actually lived life like an “ant,” whose life, for 12 consecutive years now, has only been focused on figure skating.
She started at the age of 7 and figure skating became her life. Yuna’s schedule from morning to late night has been consistent; practice and more practice. After morning and afternoon trainings, she eats a late lunch, and she practices again. She then eats a light dinner just to fill her tummy and practices until she goes to bed. Except for the days of competitions and special events, her time is only filled with figure skating. Yuna has been taking only one path alone for 12 years, fighting her loneliness and injuries. It is impossible indeed without one’s very tough spirit.
Yuna says she has never been discouraged even in poor conditions when there were no ice rinks for proper practice sessions and she had to find an alternative where she could skate. Yet she has never missed her chance for practice. Moreover, she courageously endured the extreme pains a growing skater goes through: blisters, getting used to new skates often as her body grows and also the injuries from falling and hitting the ice. She just continuously pushed herself through practice despite these problems.
Yuna has been pouring all of her passion and energy solely into figure skating; she has to give up everything others at her age “undoubtedly” enjoy and sometimes overcome sneering comments from the media.
Many people doubted Yuna’s success but she had eventually made it. She is fully occupied with training even at this moment to overcome herself. What is the real drive for her to be so disciplined? Wouldn’t it be her real “ant” spirit, in which she only thinks about one thing and overcomes her limits and challenges with the belief and conviction that she can make it, instead of falling behind or being stuck within the circumstances she faces? Her mighty will of overcoming herself and her real confidence and effort have made Yuna Kim a living legend. It was definitely not a tangible aim of winning another medal.
Let’s take a look into our own mind and see what fills it up. Check to see whether you are going forward diligently for your life goal by focusing on only that thing. If you try to accomplish your life goal with a mind filled with useless delusions, it would be impossible. Why don’t you empty your mind first? Then, start fresh from the beginning. Just like a “hard working” ant that works when working, eats when eating and sleeps when sleeping…
