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How did you spend you summer vacation? I hope you had a chance to go swimming during the hot months. Did your family take you to the beach or to a resort? Did you and your friends go to a neighbor’s house with a swimming pool or to a sports club?
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Swimming is a good sport and exercise. Although I a nun and a senior citizen, I still find time to go swimming with the other nuns. Going out together brings us closer just like a family. We get off from our busy schedule and relax and chat and we know that the exercise is good for our health in mind and body.
Each time we go swimming, I remember my childhood and how I learned how to swim. We live in a neighborhood where most of our neighbors had a pool. We used to insist to our parents to build a pool in our backyard. But I guess they had other priorities as there were eight of us children that had to be fed and sent to school. Anyway, our neighbors let us use their pool anytime we wanted to. They even joined us kids in the pool and taught us the basics of swimming.
I have a brother who used to be afraid of water. He almost drowned when he was six years old. He overcame his fear of the pool only when he had kids of his own and he had to accompany them and show to them how much fun it was to be in the water. Two of his girls won gold medals in swimming when they were in high school.
I was never afraid of the water. I guess it is because my father was very gentle with me when he was teaching me how to swim as early as five years old. He would patiently demonstrate to me how to breathe in and out of the water – inhale in the mouth and exhale through the nose – bobbing up and down, ten, twenty, fifty times until it was a habit that whenever my face was underwater, I would exhale and only when I surfaced would I inhale. I had a few painful wrong inhalings – filling my nose and lungs with water and making me cough and feel like I was drowning. But my father would be there to assure me and demonstrate to me once again what to do to relieve me of the pain.
My older sisters had a different way of teaching. They were less patient and competitive. But that challenged me to strain and achieve more than what I thought I could do. And it was always a pleasant surprise when I did reach the other end of the pool faster and less tired. My brothers were even worse in making me strive. They would tease me, pool me down, tickle me and pull my legs. I would get really mad but end up laughing because I know it was all in fun and sportsmanship.
Finally, when I was in college, swimming was required in my nursing course. Besides the different strokes in swimming, we had to learn first aid and life-saving techniques. Swimming was no longer just fun and running around the pool. We had a very strict teacher from the Philippine Red Cross. He had the eyes of an eagle. Even when he was on top of the diving board and we were in the six feet deep area of the pool, he could tell if we were doing the strokes properly. We would complain to him when our arms and legs were already aching from the repeated exercises – “Si Sir walang patawad!”. Well, his strictness paid off. We would win inter-school competitions. And years later, I had a couple of occasions when what I learned came in handy. I saved a cousin who was drowning and a sister who was stranded in the middle of the pool frozen stiff out of fear.
One becomes a good swimmer because, first of all, one wants to be a swimmer. Next, she or he has to give time to learn and repeat the lessons. Third requirement is perseverance and goal-centeredness. Finally, swimming needs cooperation and optimism or a good sense of humor.
In fact, what I just mentioned is also what is needed for one to be successful in any sport, or in anything in life, right?
I thank God for the opportunities that have come my way. I do not say I was just lucky that I had those opportunities. If not for the goodness of the people around me, I would not be where I am now. – a Good Shepherd Sister, a nurse and counselor, and the coordinator of pro-life in the Philippines.
I am sure that God is also calling you to be accomplish His mission in some way. Do you want to talk about it? Text me at 0920-945-5494.
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