“In order to be the greatest ‘you’ of all time, embrace the opportunity to be a leader.”
Everyone struggles with being overwhelmed or second-guessing. Even Simone Biles—star of the U.S. gymnastics team and revered “GOAT” with 11 Olympic medals—can let the doubt creep in. But in passing down her mother’s words of wisdom to the next class of go-getters, nerve-wracked graduates can see that even people at the top of their game have to cope with stress.
“Go out there and write your own story—only one that you can tell,” she continued.
Biles knows a thing or two about hitting her mark with extreme accuracy—it’s the kind of talent and drive that solidified the U.S. gymnastics team as one of the best in the world. But she assured the graduates that sometimes things go belly-up, and that’s alright.
“The world doesn’t need you to be perfect,” Biles said during her speech. “It needs you to be bold, it needs you to care, and to keep going even when things don’t go as planned.”
While the athletic legend espouses a non-perfectionist idea of what it means to succeed, she drove home the point that it takes a lot of elbow grease to get there. They need to be committed to their goals to get to the top—but it’s a ‘work-hard-play-hard’ lifestyle, with passion at the center.
“Success in education, like in athletics, requires sacrifice and dedication,” Biles said. “There is a lot of fun along the way, but to make it to the top, you also really need to find joy in the work.”
“The second is, with time you realize most of those decisions are inconsequential.”
“‘They are hard, right? So don’t be so tough on yourself.’”
