Hey guys, it's Rachel and today I just wanted to talk about some of the stuff that I learned while starting gymnastics really late and for those of you who are new to my channel, I started this YouTube channel for the sole purpose of sharing my gymnastics videos and if you kind of like go back and the old my old videos it's all about gymnastics and if any if you probably everybody knows what gymnastics is and it requires a lot of physical strength, a lot of flexibility, a lot of mental capacity that you know one needs to have in order to fly themselves like up in the air but most people who are gymnasts start out at a very young age, some even like at the age of like 18 months before they're even walking properly and I think most people tend to start at age four or five and then they progress on to the US AG team at the age of round five or six. When you're about five or six you are very flexible, you have, you're not really fearful of the possibilities of what can happen to you if you fall off a four inch beam or if you're like flying up in the air and you have a better better chance of the coaches being able to catch you and being able to you know spot you for difficult skills so you just learn a lot quicker but for me I started gymnastics at the age of 14, no, at the age of 13 and that is an extremely late age and delayed late because usually at the age of 12 or 13 gymnasts are usually in their elite level stages or at least like upper level nine, 10s. So I'm taking this class at one of my first gyms and I'm in this class and you know everything is age grouped by ages so I am in a class with older girls but I'm seeing these team girls you know that are like seven and they're throwing like full and they're throwing like double back you know double back talks and you know here I am learning a pull over on bars and learning you know a handstand and it was quite embarrassing actually and before I started gymnastics I did quite a bit of take-wondo martial arts about 10 years and then I also did about eight years of ballet so I definitely have the grace the you know the swath of gymnastics down and I had the strength down from martial arts but it was just like you know conforming your body into ways that they've never conformed before and I think the thing that I've really had to struggle with the most was the fear I could not get on that balance beam and to flips on it it just did not seem saying to me so anyways I'm on this team I mean I'm at the gymnastics center and learning back bends and learning all those basic stuff and I'm just quite tired of it like I really like this sport and but it was just getting really um straining and it was getting kind of embarrassing actually so I stopped and my family and I removed actually and we were no longer near that gymnastics center and then after a bit I wanted to try again and I started at a local I'm CA center and at this I'm CA center it was really different because the equipment they had to share what they had to share that gymnasium with the basketball team so the coaches had to get there early and like set up all the gymnastics equipment and then like put it all back so we didn't really have a spring floor we didn't have like a foam pit we didn't have like a trampoline or any of that we had very basic equipment but I really liked how free everything seemed like like it didn't seem really uptight the coaches seemed really relaxed and like they didn't really push me into doing stuff that I really wasn't ready for and because of that encouragement I think I've been able to progress really fast and about six months into that YMCA center so I was about 4th almost 14 I got on to team and I was a level 4 gymnas at the age of 14 years old and I got my back hands raised I got my pullovers I got my front hip circles I got my you know dismount off beam and all that good stuff and I just kept progressing on to level seven and I quit gymnastics at level seven and that was because I was 18 and I had to go away to college the first thing I learned while starting gymnastics late is that don't let what other people think of you stop you from doing what you love and I know the sounds really cliche but it's so true and if I had let what other people think of me get in the way of fulfilling my dream as a gymnast I would have never gotten on to team I would have never really found a passion for such a sport I would have never found the values and the worth of you know continuously doing something that you really love because of the encouragement from my coaches and from my teammates I persevered and I got up to level seven four years after starting my gymnastics career four years that number two so I believe that perseverance and hard work beats natural talent any day because yes you know people do have natural talent they have natural athletic abilities genetics bless with genetics but I don't think I was because first and foremost I do not have the physique of a gymnast and by that what I mean by that is I have a really I have a long torso and wide hip well not wide hips but like I have hips and then kind of short legs so that's not really a good physique for gymnast because you can create a lot of back problems and it's really hard to be flexible with your upper body especially like your shoulders and your back and then I already had the had the this had already had you know the disadvantage of age so I just was not at an advantage at all and though I you know had the strength from martial arts and though I had the grace and you know the the dancing from ballet I couldn't get those to form and combine into gymnastics because it's a different type of dance it's a different type of strength and it's a different type of flexibility so it was really hard to kind of incorporate everything into this one sport and it took a lot of hard work and I remember I would search up like I was on level four but I already knew all the level five and level six skills and like their floor routines I had them down by the time I was in level four because I just watched so many YouTube videos on them I made sure I watched all the like tutorials on every skill that you needed for the level that I was on and the level that I was gonna be on the next season and I basically lived in my leotard I practiced every single day at home I conditioned myself like five hours a day I loved Saturdays and Sundays because I you know got to stay home and I would be conditioning all day I bought a balance beam and I and like this is stupid but the balance beam because I you know I'm tall I'm not tall but I'm like not short so I would have I bought a balance beam that wasn't like on the ground balance beam but kind of like a medium balance beam so what I would go on top of it like my hands would touch the ceiling so if I would do with skill or handstand that would have been a mess so I had to drag that gymongus beam out to my back yard with mats and and you know after I was finished I would have to bring it back in so it was a lot of hard work to even do a couple of things on beam at my house practice at home my house so but you know perseverance I did it you know I didn't improve or I wasn't able to get to level seven or even on competitive team by just relying on my you know past martial arts or ballet experience it definitely took a lot of conditioning like I said it took a lot of mental strength it took a lot of you know encouraging myself and encouraging you know my body that I can do it so yes president answered hard work be a natural talent any day and the last one number three is to just have fun just so uptight you lose passion and you lose interest in what you love and and you lose like the bigger picture I feel like yes in gymnastics I was able to do a sport that I absolutely loved but just the memories of my my teammates and I going to competitions going on long drives hanging out with each other I mean they were like my family and I think if I was just so uptight and concentrated on just gymnastics I wouldn't have you know had as much fun and it was just really the people and on the environment that really sparked you know a love for the sport a love for gymnastics and I miss it so much I remember my friends and I would dance to Hannah Montana hold down throw down and I miss getting blisters on my hands my hands are no longer they're no longer callous free I don't know if it'll focus but yeah they're all soft now and I miss having so much gel in my hair from you know competitions I miss my leotards and feeling healthy and feeling like I can fly and I'm 23 now so I can't like I just my body doesn't want to do that anymore but yeah I hope you guys enjoyed and I hope that you know that you guys just don't back down with whatever that you love to do just because of what other people might think of you and because you know what like you can achieve so much more and you learn a whole lot than just gymnastics itself you learn perseverance you learn discipline you learn mentality you learn strength you learn bravery you learn how to push your boundaries and your capabilities you learn how to flaunt your flaws you learn how to embrace your differences and most importantly you learn not to care about what other people think of you I hope you guys enjoyed this video and I'll see you in the next video bye