Author John Irving (The World According to Garp, The Cider House Rules, and A Prayer for Owen Meany) also has a lifelong interest in wrestling that began as a high school student at Phillips Exeter. Here’s how he compares wrestling to writing (from this NPR story):
Many of my wrestling friends find it odd that I’m a writer. Just as many of my friends in the writing world find it odd that for so many years I was a wrestler and a wrestling coach. But they seem very similar to me. In both cases, you have to be devoted to tireless repetition and small details for many more hours than you will be in competition. You will be with a nameless workout partner, a sparring partner, drilling the same outside single leg dive, inside collar tie, hundreds upon thousands of times. Well, how many times as a writer should you rewrite the same sentence? The same paragraph? The same chapter? If you’re good you never tire of that."
That's a lot like how successful college applicants approach their activities.
They don't volunteer at the homeless shelter, play goalie on the hockey team, or sing in the school musical because they hope it will get them into college. They do it because they love it. And that genuine enthusiasm tends to reveal itself in their dedication.
Real dedication isn’t a student who just slogs through the hours so he can list the activity on his college application. It’s the volunteer who stays late when the crew serving food needs an extra set of hands, the hockey goalie who practices for three hours to make one kind of save, or the lead in the musical who takes a vocal class on Sundays just to improve her range.
If you love it, you never tire of it.