Sometimes I compare coaching to eternal ideas.
I'm a coach. I have 19 girls to worry about, care about, and try to progress in their sport. I lose sleep over them. I laugh with them. I hope for them and I cry with them.
I make them condition. They hate it. I know this. But I also know they want to win at competition. I know that they need to progress if they are going to win. I know they need to push themselves and get stronger. I know they'll be much more proud of themselves if they do. I know all this. And I assume they know this. And yet, they complain. They request not to do it. I get that. It's hard. It hurts. It's tiring. It's not fun. But... It will help. I think, instead of them complaining can't they just see how I'm not doing this to punish them? I'm doing it to help them?
Then it hit me. Heavenly Fathers motives and tactics are no different. He sees our potential. He worries about us. Loves us. Rejoices and cries with us. He too puts us through hard things, knowing we won't like it, but knowing what it will in the end produce.
This is mercy. Not always giving us what we want. But giving us what we need. So that when all is said and done, we accomplish something greater than we had originally intended. With His help, guidance and encouragement we become strong, faster, more disciplined. Patient, understanding, and simply more. More than what we were to begin with.
So to my team and my students, never will I stop pushing you and asking hard things. You deserve to see progress in yourself. You deserve to get stronger. You deserve more.
