Day One

Today I was able to wake up early and spend some solid time with the Lord. So what my soul needed. I just get overwhelmed by the Lord's greatness every time I think about being here. It is 100% because of him and I am so thankful to have this opportunity. It has already been a ton of fun!

We got up and went to breakfast as a team at a little bagel shop. It was good.



I was able to get on the boards today, which was great. I am someone who takes a while to adjust to other pools and boards, so having two days to practice before I compete is great. Today we just played around in the morning. Did easy dives, lots of jumps and standings. The diving well here has a really dark blue bottom, which is different from our light blue pool back home. It has taken me longer than I would have thought to get used to it. Spotting is a little different. When you see the dark blue you are actually seeing the bottom of the pool, whereas in our pool, since it is lighter and looks brighter, you end up seeing the water, not the bottom of the pool. So the spotting of my dives is a little different. Its just taking some time to get used to, but it hasn't been too bad. Practice as a whole went well this morning. Nothing spectacular, but just getting a feel for the new surroundings.






Casey and I then came back and chilled at our hotel for a little while. I was able to email some friends and just relax. We then went out to lunch with the team to Chipotle, which is always a good option. I ate my entire burrito, which was delicious.





We then came back to the hotel and chilled some more. Then Casey and I went back to the pool and got on the boards again, this time doing our harder dives. Things went well again. Still adjusting, but nothing terrible.

Being at the pool has definitely started to make this a reality. I still feel like competing is so far away since its not till Thursday, but everything is starting to set in. I've been still kind of feeling inadequate. I just feel like I'm not a good enough diver to be able to say that I competed at a National Championship. I'm just an ordinary girl. There's nothing spectacular or magical about me. I'm not really all that good of a diver. That's a pretty honest statement. I just keep thinking, "I'm not really that good." And I don't really think this is a super negative way either. I love diving, I've definitely improved a significant amount over the past two years, but I'm nothing special. I don't win meets or beat a lot of people I dive against. I don't have a bunch of medals (or even any for that matter) or honors in diving. I'm just your average girl who loves to dive and for some reason can rip the water pretty well.

But sometimes I have the flip side as well. As much as I hate comparison, it is hard to watch girls from other teams and not mentally think about if you can do the dive they just did better than that. The whole, "sizing up your competition" thing. I don't like doing it, and its not something I think about a lot, but there definitely are those passing thoughts. And honestly, after today, I know that if I dive to the best of my ability I can beat some people. This kind of encourages me for a second, but then things start to go downhill. I then start thinking about places and scoring points and getting to repeat my dives and wanting to do well and then I get nervous and try too hard and then I look like I've never dove before in my life. So it turns into bad thinking. I am here to have fun. I am here to embrace this opportunity. I will dive for the Lord's glory and his glory alone. I am here to learn what the Lord has to teach me.

After our second practice Casey and I grabbed some smoothies, which were excellent. Man, I love smoothies! And then headed back to our room.



Tonight we had the kick off banquet. Everyone got dressed up and we had a formal dinner with an Olympic swimmer as a speaker. The food was pretty good and it was fun to officially start things off. It is truly an honor to be here. I feel so unworthy. I am unworthy. The Lord gets ALL the glory. He got me here. I don't know how many times I've said that, but it is completely the truth. He got me here and he is going to walk me through this week. What a faithful Father I have. He is so worthy. I just have to trust in him. He knows the results, he knows what is going to happen. He has a plan. I'm just along for the ride :)







Oh yeah, and my dad gets here tomorrow!!! WHOO HOO!