"Baseball is about going home ... and how hard it is to get there, and how driven is our need." — A. Bartlett Giamatti
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
The Natural: Post 5
Ambition ... it drives Roy to do some stupid things and it drives him to greatness. In your life, how have your ambitions gotten the better of you? How have your ambitions helped you succeed? Be specific but appropriate in your personal reference.
My ambition has allowed me to achieve many of my goals in life, but sometimes it does have negative consequences. I think the positive affects of my ambition are found in music. My desire to be a great musician drives me to dedicate a lot of time to practicing music, and as a result I have improved a lot. I also strive to be a good student, and my ambition allows me to accomplish this as well. Where my ambition can get the better of me is at physical activities. One of my goals is to become a great snowboarder. To realize this goal, I often find myself going outside my comfort zone and trying tricks or turns with high chances of failure. Though this has led to my improvement, it has also led to quite a few injuries on the slopes.
Ambition has helped me to succeed because it’s given me the confidence to take risks and some leaps of faith in order to achieve my goals. I’ve found that to be true in many areas of my life, from writing to piano, but a good (as well as recent) example is in theater. As several of you know, I was recently in a production of Jesus Christ Superstar. Not only was executing the production itself an ambitious goal (Jesus Christ Superstar usually requires at least thirty people for the ensemble alone…we had eleven total), but I also had an ambitious role for me. I really wanted to have a big part, even if it meant overcoming my insecurities about singing in front of other people. When I was offered one, I took it, because I wanted to have an actual character more than I didn’t want to sing. I’m so glad I took that risk, because I had a great time. However, ambition can also blind me to areas I need to improve on in order to accomplish those goals. I think this happens most with writing. Sometimes I will get super excited about something I’m writing, something I just want to keep writing and writing because the idea or the story or whatever it is seems so perfect in my head. When this happens, I’ll be reluctant to look back over the story and revise it, because I’m so dedicated to making it great, so focused on finding and drawing out its best parts, that I have trouble seeing how to make everything good. Slowly, I’m learning that pure drive and energy can only get a project so far, and that caution and careful tweaks are just as essential to making a story as fantastic as I want it to be.
The majority of the time my personal ambitions help better myself, but there have been plenty of times where my ambitions have been the cause of my downfall in a certain aspect. For example my ambition to become better than my friend in a video game. Although I accomplished my goal I spent way too much time playing the video game, when I could have been doing something more productive, whether it was reading, helping out in the house, or getting outside and being active. In other scenarios ambition can be very helpful in helping me succeed. Whether its working hard in sports practice to better myself or spending an extra hour of studying to ensure that i receive a good grade on an upcoming test, my ambition to better myself in a certain aspect has been very beneficial.
Like others have mentioned, my ambition has helped me to step out of my comfort zone. Last year when I applied to city term, my determination kept me working on my application, even though I didn't think I had a great chance of getting accepted. It was something I really wanted, and my ambition helped me get it. One way that my ambition has hurt me is in sports. From 5th grade to 8th grade I played on a select soccer team. I wanted to be one of the best on my team, and I worked really hard to try to improve. But it seemed that my ambition blinded me of my true feelings. I was so focused on improving, that I didn't realize that I really did not enjoy soccer. I dreaded practices and hated being put in as goalie, but I thought that if I could become the best on the team, everything I would be happy while playing.
Most of the time, my ambitions allow me to do certain things for the better and improve myself, but there are moments where my drive and goals have limited what I am able to do. One example is with sports, a common area where ambition separates a top athlete from the rest. My ambitions have certainly led me to become a better athlete, whether it be the extra practices during the week or the extra hour at the gym. My ambitions as far as my sports life goes have certainly driven me to become a better athlete, but there are times where my other ambitions are for the worst. One example where ambition ended up hurting me was when I was studying for a test late at night. I wanted to do well on the test, so I stayed up really late trying to study, but in the end I didn't sleep enough, so I didn't do as well. My ambition was filled with good intention, but in the end it did more harm than good.
Throughout my life I have been ambitious in many different ways. This ambition, however, has played out in both positive and negative ways. In Model United Nations, I have succeeded due to ambition. Whether I am well studied on the topic being discussed or am clueless as to what India's national view on Intellectual Property Rights, I have been ambitious by acting like I know what I am talking about. My ambitions in Model UN have convinced an entire room of delegates against North Korea to agree to lift all sanctions on a the nuclear armed nation and my ambitious goals in Model UN have resulted in success.
Ambition has also gotten me into some less favorable situation. Whether its wrestling someone almost twice my size or running an experiment to see if my car really can't fit into an ultra-tight parking spot, my ambition has directly backfired into the back of my skull or in the car's case the side bumper...
Overall, ambition has only made me stronger. More times than not my ambition drives me to succeed in areas where normally I would come up short. The main area that comes to mind is sports. When I was younger all I wanted to do was to be able to throw the ball harder and hit the ball farther than my dad. I was so set on achieving this goal that I would spend a good portion of everyday in my backyard simply throwing the ball against the wall or having my dad pitch wiffle balls to me. At the same time, sometimes that ambition has caused me to make some not so smart decisions. Because I love sports so much and have turned into an avid golfer, I play/watch sports instead of doing something a bit more academic. For example, in middle school I would go and play nine holes after school rather than doing homework. Then after coming home, I might watch the Giants game as oppose to writing a certain essay. This passion and ambition for sports is extremely rewarding in some areas but can be costly in others.
Ambition has definitely helped me more than anything in the past. It is most applicable in terms of sports, especially soccer, as I have pursued my goals in the sport and ultimately have reached many of those. Probably my biggest goal and ambition for soccer has been attempting to play in college. I had to greatly improve this last year and my work and continued drive lead to me reaching that goal. My ambition has lead me to reach that goal and many others. Ambition has also driven me to do some stupid things. Sophomore year I challenged someone who was much bigger than me and paid the consequences as I got my ass handed to me.
When I reflect about my ambitions, I think of how, at least academically, they tend to get me going in the wrong direction. For example, as you may know, I am a very competitive person. So, in middle school I would always want to do better than my friends on tests and essays. Although this was not always the case, whenever it was I would rub it in others' faces and be exuberant that I succeeded in my goal. However I probably made my peers feel bad to put myself up. Another ambition I can think about is through sports. Growing up I wanted to be a great athlete in baseball, soccer, football, tennis, golf, and any other sport one can imagine. However, being this ambitious tore me in so many different directions that I ended up being an OK player at many sports, not excelling in one particular sport.
Despite all of the good that ambitions can bring, sometimes they can just be too great. There have been times in my life when I've become too confident, too ambitious, and have tried to accomplish something that I just cannot possibly accomplish. There have been times that I have had to settle for less than what I believed I could achieve, particularly in the realm of school, because my ambitions have gotten the better of me.
In other areas, my ambitions have really helped me get to a place that I could not have otherwise been. Musically, I have been very ambitious, and have put in a lot of work (especially over the last four years) to get to the place I am today, a place that I never believed I could be. Another example is in the realm of theater. Back in seventh grade, I was really into doing theater, and because of my attempts and willingness to put myself out there, I got a role in a professional, paid production of Our Town, which I still consider one of the greatest experiences of my life.
I think about my ambitions and dreams every day and I think it is important to allow myself to think freely about them and not to tell myself to stop thinking about them. Most of my goals have to do with playing golf. I have set long term and short terms goals for myself that I hope to one day accomplish. My ambition gets the better of me when I set goals for myself that do not make sense in the amount of time I have allotted them. Sometimes this causes me to become nervous or anxious and a little bit upset if my golf game is not where I want it to be on a certain day. However if I set goals with appropriate amounts of time and really put 100% in what I am trying to accomplish, I feel so much euphoria when I do accomplish what I have set for myself.
My ambitions have been the ignition of the already present potential in myself. I have always been told that i have a lot of potential to do great things, but if i do not have goals in my life that i want to succeed. Although i may have these set ambitions, i also have to have flexibility. Sometimes things might not result in the preferred form, but one must always try and conform to those changes. I have always tried to maintain on the right track, but i am always prepared for any plight that may appear.
My ambitions have had a great affect on my life. Though they have definitely changed year by year, they always help keep me on track and make me think of what I want constantly. Music was one of my ambitions, soccer as well, nut once I realized that I could not achieve the greatness that I was hoping for, I always moved on to the next thing. My ambitions are currently to achieve some sort of "greatness" on the baseball field and this had had both positive and negative effects on my life. I strive to be the best player possible, which has really helped me get a lot better at the game, both on the field and at the plate. My strong ambition has also caused problems. Due to the fact that I am always think about baseball, my attention often strays from homework, and classwork making it difficult to stay on track in school.
Ambition is what keeps me doing what I do. If I was not an ambitious person, I would not be at MA, I would not play sports, and I would not be an outspoken social justice kid. If I did not have the goals to go to college and the ambition to succeed, I would have nothing. I would have a 2.00 at Novato High. Ambition is everything, if not the only thing I need to succeed. Whether I live in Marin or the projects, I am only going to go as far as my ambition allows me. I have accomplished many personal goals in my life. My most significant is winning an MVP award in both basketball and baseball. I put my mind to being better than everyone else and thats exactly what I need. Sports has built who I am, as well as given me the ambition to strive for how far I want to go in life.
Ambition for success is what drives most of what I do. This mainly comes out in my school work. I spend an abnormal amount of time doing homework, and have a self enforced bedtime of 9:30 so that I can be very awake at school. This has been beneficial for me throughout high school, even though it did limit my social life I still did well and got into college, which was what felt like the ultimate goal. This is an example of ambition and goals resulting in the desired accomplishment.
Another example is my ambition not only resulting in failure, but also having a negative effect. Junior year, I was determined to improve my time in cross country. I trained really hard in practice, and also on the weekends and began to slice minutes off of my times from the year before. However, about half way through the season I began to develop shin splints that I couldn't get rid of. I bought new shoes, iced my legs, and got them wrapped up every day, but they still continued to worsen. What I should have done was take time off of running to allow myself to heal, but I was so determined to cut my time even more that I did not stop running. In the last race, my shins hurt so badly that I didn't think I could finish. My final time was not an improvement, and on top of that, my legs did not stop hurting, even when I walked, for months. Since then, I have never been able to run regularly without starting to get shin splints again. This is an example of ambition getting in the way of of what was both practical and healthy for me.
Ambition is clearly a key to success, but it does not always reward you with happiness. I was ambitious in becoming a drummer and I took lessons and studied for many years before coming to MA. When I got here I realized that there was an excess of talented drummers and the school lacked bassists. My ambition to be good at drumming ended up being negative because it diverged my attention from playing bass. Ambition has led me to some success at MA and in snowboarding and soccer. But it also has led to some disappointments. The American Dream is about working hard to achieve success, but some people live to regret their ambitions.
I feel that ambition has always been present in my life and has allowed me to achieve certain goals, but it does, on occasion, lead to negative side effects. As much as ambition is useful and necessary, it can be a distraction. Being over-ambitious and/or too driven by my ambition has caused me to let myself and others down on a few occasions. Typically, my ambition has caused me to be too independent, thereby causing me to become overwhelmed when I am too stubborn to ask for help with whatever I am pursuing. On the other hand, ambition has definitely helped me. Without ambition, I would not have been motivated to apply to college (and get in!), to pursue a path of study and hopefully a career in a very difficult subject, and to do something worthwhile with my life. My ambition not only makes me strive to be the best student I can be, but it also sometimes inspires me to take risks and venture outside of my comfort zone. One specific example involves a recent outing that I went on. I usually consider myself to be a "safe" person, meaning that I can be almost neurotic when it comes to things like cleaning rituals, etc. My ambition to enjoy this outing to the fullest extent possible drove me to leave most of my inhibitions about dirt and germs behind and revel in being outdoors. I got dirt and sand and various bits of vegetation all over myself when setting up the tent, kayaking, and hiking - I didn't shower for almost three days - and amazingly, I simply loved it!
My ambition has allowed me to achieve many of my goals in life, but sometimes it does have negative consequences. I think the positive affects of my ambition are found in music. My desire to be a great musician drives me to dedicate a lot of time to practicing music, and as a result I have improved a lot. I also strive to be a good student, and my ambition allows me to accomplish this as well.
ReplyDeleteWhere my ambition can get the better of me is at physical activities. One of my goals is to become a great snowboarder. To realize this goal, I often find myself going outside my comfort zone and trying tricks or turns with high chances of failure. Though this has led to my improvement, it has also led to quite a few injuries on the slopes.
Ambition has helped me to succeed because it’s given me the confidence to take risks and some leaps of faith in order to achieve my goals. I’ve found that to be true in many areas of my life, from writing to piano, but a good (as well as recent) example is in theater. As several of you know, I was recently in a production of Jesus Christ Superstar. Not only was executing the production itself an ambitious goal (Jesus Christ Superstar usually requires at least thirty people for the ensemble alone…we had eleven total), but I also had an ambitious role for me. I really wanted to have a big part, even if it meant overcoming my insecurities about singing in front of other people. When I was offered one, I took it, because I wanted to have an actual character more than I didn’t want to sing. I’m so glad I took that risk, because I had a great time.
ReplyDeleteHowever, ambition can also blind me to areas I need to improve on in order to accomplish those goals. I think this happens most with writing. Sometimes I will get super excited about something I’m writing, something I just want to keep writing and writing because the idea or the story or whatever it is seems so perfect in my head. When this happens, I’ll be reluctant to look back over the story and revise it, because I’m so dedicated to making it great, so focused on finding and drawing out its best parts, that I have trouble seeing how to make everything good. Slowly, I’m learning that pure drive and energy can only get a project so far, and that caution and careful tweaks are just as essential to making a story as fantastic as I want it to be.
The majority of the time my personal ambitions help better myself, but there have been plenty of times where my ambitions have been the cause of my downfall in a certain aspect. For example my ambition to become better than my friend in a video game. Although I accomplished my goal I spent way too much time playing the video game, when I could have been doing something more productive, whether it was reading, helping out in the house, or getting outside and being active.
ReplyDeleteIn other scenarios ambition can be very helpful in helping me succeed. Whether its working hard in sports practice to better myself or spending an extra hour of studying to ensure that i receive a good grade on an upcoming test, my ambition to better myself in a certain aspect has been very beneficial.
Like others have mentioned, my ambition has helped me to step out of my comfort zone. Last year when I applied to city term, my determination kept me working on my application, even though I didn't think I had a great chance of getting accepted. It was something I really wanted, and my ambition helped me get it.
ReplyDeleteOne way that my ambition has hurt me is in sports. From 5th grade to 8th grade I played on a select soccer team. I wanted to be one of the best on my team, and I worked really hard to try to improve. But it seemed that my ambition blinded me of my true feelings. I was so focused on improving, that I didn't realize that I really did not enjoy soccer. I dreaded practices and hated being put in as goalie, but I thought that if I could become the best on the team, everything I would be happy while playing.
Most of the time, my ambitions allow me to do certain things for the better and improve myself, but there are moments where my drive and goals have limited what I am able to do. One example is with sports, a common area where ambition separates a top athlete from the rest. My ambitions have certainly led me to become a better athlete, whether it be the extra practices during the week or the extra hour at the gym. My ambitions as far as my sports life goes have certainly driven me to become a better athlete, but there are times where my other ambitions are for the worst. One example where ambition ended up hurting me was when I was studying for a test late at night. I wanted to do well on the test, so I stayed up really late trying to study, but in the end I didn't sleep enough, so I didn't do as well. My ambition was filled with good intention, but in the end it did more harm than good.
ReplyDeleteThroughout my life I have been ambitious in many different ways. This ambition, however, has played out in both positive and negative ways. In Model United Nations, I have succeeded due to ambition. Whether I am well studied on the topic being discussed or am clueless as to what India's national view on Intellectual Property Rights, I have been ambitious by acting like I know what I am talking about. My ambitions in Model UN have convinced an entire room of delegates against North Korea to agree to lift all sanctions on a the nuclear armed nation and my ambitious goals in Model UN have resulted in success.
ReplyDeleteAmbition has also gotten me into some less favorable situation. Whether its wrestling someone almost twice my size or running an experiment to see if my car really can't fit into an ultra-tight parking spot, my ambition has directly backfired into the back of my skull or in the car's case the side bumper...
Overall, ambition has only made me stronger. More times than not my ambition drives me to succeed in areas where normally I would come up short. The main area that comes to mind is sports. When I was younger all I wanted to do was to be able to throw the ball harder and hit the ball farther than my dad. I was so set on achieving this goal that I would spend a good portion of everyday in my backyard simply throwing the ball against the wall or having my dad pitch wiffle balls to me. At the same time, sometimes that ambition has caused me to make some not so smart decisions. Because I love sports so much and have turned into an avid golfer, I play/watch sports instead of doing something a bit more academic. For example, in middle school I would go and play nine holes after school rather than doing homework. Then after coming home, I might watch the Giants game as oppose to writing a certain essay. This passion and ambition for sports is extremely rewarding in some areas but can be costly in others.
ReplyDeleteAmbition has definitely helped me more than anything in the past. It is most applicable in terms of sports, especially soccer, as I have pursued my goals in the sport and ultimately have reached many of those. Probably my biggest goal and ambition for soccer has been attempting to play in college. I had to greatly improve this last year and my work and continued drive lead to me reaching that goal. My ambition has lead me to reach that goal and many others.
ReplyDeleteAmbition has also driven me to do some stupid things. Sophomore year I challenged someone who was much bigger than me and paid the consequences as I got my ass handed to me.
When I reflect about my ambitions, I think of how, at least academically, they tend to get me going in the wrong direction. For example, as you may know, I am a very competitive person. So, in middle school I would always want to do better than my friends on tests and essays. Although this was not always the case, whenever it was I would rub it in others' faces and be exuberant that I succeeded in my goal. However I probably made my peers feel bad to put myself up. Another ambition I can think about is through sports. Growing up I wanted to be a great athlete in baseball, soccer, football, tennis, golf, and any other sport one can imagine. However, being this ambitious tore me in so many different directions that I ended up being an OK player at many sports, not excelling in one particular sport.
ReplyDeleteDespite all of the good that ambitions can bring, sometimes they can just be too great. There have been times in my life when I've become too confident, too ambitious, and have tried to accomplish something that I just cannot possibly accomplish. There have been times that I have had to settle for less than what I believed I could achieve, particularly in the realm of school, because my ambitions have gotten the better of me.
ReplyDeleteIn other areas, my ambitions have really helped me get to a place that I could not have otherwise been. Musically, I have been very ambitious, and have put in a lot of work (especially over the last four years) to get to the place I am today, a place that I never believed I could be. Another example is in the realm of theater. Back in seventh grade, I was really into doing theater, and because of my attempts and willingness to put myself out there, I got a role in a professional, paid production of Our Town, which I still consider one of the greatest experiences of my life.
I think about my ambitions and dreams every day and I think it is important to allow myself to think freely about them and not to tell myself to stop thinking about them. Most of my goals have to do with playing golf. I have set long term and short terms goals for myself that I hope to one day accomplish. My ambition gets the better of me when I set goals for myself that do not make sense in the amount of time I have allotted them. Sometimes this causes me to become nervous or anxious and a little bit upset if my golf game is not where I want it to be on a certain day. However if I set goals with appropriate amounts of time and really put 100% in what I am trying to accomplish, I feel so much euphoria when I do accomplish what I have set for myself.
ReplyDeleteMy ambitions have been the ignition of the already present potential in myself. I have always been told that i have a lot of potential to do great things, but if i do not have goals in my life that i want to succeed. Although i may have these set ambitions, i also have to have flexibility. Sometimes things might not result in the preferred form, but one must always try and conform to those changes. I have always tried to maintain on the right track, but i am always prepared for any plight that may appear.
ReplyDeleteMy ambitions have had a great affect on my life. Though they have definitely changed year by year, they always help keep me on track and make me think of what I want constantly. Music was one of my ambitions, soccer as well, nut once I realized that I could not achieve the greatness that I was hoping for, I always moved on to the next thing. My ambitions are currently to achieve some sort of "greatness" on the baseball field and this had had both positive and negative effects on my life. I strive to be the best player possible, which has really helped me get a lot better at the game, both on the field and at the plate. My strong ambition has also caused problems. Due to the fact that I am always think about baseball, my attention often strays from homework, and classwork making it difficult to stay on track in school.
ReplyDeleteAmbition is what keeps me doing what I do. If I was not an ambitious person, I would not be at MA, I would not play sports, and I would not be an outspoken social justice kid. If I did not have the goals to go to college and the ambition to succeed, I would have nothing. I would have a 2.00 at Novato High. Ambition is everything, if not the only thing I need to succeed. Whether I live in Marin or the projects, I am only going to go as far as my ambition allows me. I have accomplished many personal goals in my life. My most significant is winning an MVP award in both basketball and baseball. I put my mind to being better than everyone else and thats exactly what I need. Sports has built who I am, as well as given me the ambition to strive for how far I want to go in life.
ReplyDeleteAmbition for success is what drives most of what I do. This mainly comes out in my school work. I spend an abnormal amount of time doing homework, and have a self enforced bedtime of 9:30 so that I can be very awake at school. This has been beneficial for me throughout high school, even though it did limit my social life I still did well and got into college, which was what felt like the ultimate goal. This is an example of ambition and goals resulting in the desired accomplishment.
ReplyDeleteAnother example is my ambition not only resulting in failure, but also having a negative effect. Junior year, I was determined to improve my time in cross country. I trained really hard in practice, and also on the weekends and began to slice minutes off of my times from the year before. However, about half way through the season I began to develop shin splints that I couldn't get rid of. I bought new shoes, iced my legs, and got them wrapped up every day, but they still continued to worsen. What I should have done was take time off of running to allow myself to heal, but I was so determined to cut my time even more that I did not stop running. In the last race, my shins hurt so badly that I didn't think I could finish. My final time was not an improvement, and on top of that, my legs did not stop hurting, even when I walked, for months. Since then, I have never been able to run regularly without starting to get shin splints again. This is an example of ambition getting in the way of of what was both practical and healthy for me.
Ambition is clearly a key to success, but it does not always reward you with happiness. I was ambitious in becoming a drummer and I took lessons and studied for many years before coming to MA. When I got here I realized that there was an excess of talented drummers and the school lacked bassists. My ambition to be good at drumming ended up being negative because it diverged my attention from playing bass. Ambition has led me to some success at MA and in snowboarding and soccer. But it also has led to some disappointments. The American Dream is about working hard to achieve success, but some people live to regret their ambitions.
ReplyDeleteI feel that ambition has always been present in my life and has allowed me to achieve certain goals, but it does, on occasion, lead to negative side effects. As much as ambition is useful and necessary, it can be a distraction. Being over-ambitious and/or too driven by my ambition has caused me to let myself and others down on a few occasions. Typically, my ambition has caused me to be too independent, thereby causing me to become overwhelmed when I am too stubborn to ask for help with whatever I am pursuing.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, ambition has definitely helped me. Without ambition, I would not have been motivated to apply to college (and get in!), to pursue a path of study and hopefully a career in a very difficult subject, and to do something worthwhile with my life.
My ambition not only makes me strive to be the best student I can be, but it also sometimes inspires me to take risks and venture outside of my comfort zone. One specific example involves a recent outing that I went on. I usually consider myself to be a "safe" person, meaning that I can be almost neurotic when it comes to things like cleaning rituals, etc. My ambition to enjoy this outing to the fullest extent possible drove me to leave most of my inhibitions about dirt and germs behind and revel in being outdoors. I got dirt and sand and various bits of vegetation all over myself when setting up the tent, kayaking, and hiking - I didn't shower for almost three days - and amazingly, I simply loved it!