How Cheerleading Has Affected My Life

Ever since I was six years old cheering on my local Pop Warner team, I have dedicated an unwavering amount of time and dedication to my beloved sport. Whether it’s staying at school until six o’clock every day or spending my weekends making choreography for my team, cheer affects my life inside and outside of school. The life lessons and qualities I’ve developed through cheer are traits that I can utilize for the rest of my life. Most notably, cheer has taught me the value of hard work. My team at Kennedy High School has competed in 3 competitions through Sharp Internationals and Jamz Cheer and Dance. There were days I had to stay for practice until seven o’clock in preparation for the competitions. I often wanted to give up; I doubted my strength …show more content…
With every practice of my routine, with every lap I ran to boost my stamina, with every vocal exercise I did to strengthen my diaphragm, I was one step closer to my goal. Although it was hard, I finally experienced the value of hard work when my team was announced as overall first place winners at our first competition. It was also experiences like being my team’s captain for two years that contributed to my valuing of hard work. It is not easy leading an entire team, but the hard work all pays off when we hear that crowd cheer for us after perfectly executing a tedious performance. Along with reaching my goals as a cheerleader, I also began to apply the same attitude to reaching my goals academically. I used to be so afraid of failure that I wouldn’t even challenge myself. I thought it was better to excel in classes that I knew I could pass than to challenge myself and accept the grade I earned. Cheer taught me that being a student-athlete doesn’t mean that I have to take the easy way out. I took my first AP class during my junior year and was able to ace it using the qualities I learned through cheer. I even challenged myself further by taking two college courses and an AP class during my senior