“We just have to take it one game at a time.”
That’s the professional athlete’s PR-coached answer when asked about their team’s prospects early in the season. When the entire season is in front of you, it seems farfetched to talk about winning the Super Bowl. The path to glory, the one that lets you hold the trophy at the end of the season, requires that you win plenty of individual games along the way.
It makes sense, but it’s not entirely true.
The mission of a professional sports franchise isn’t just to win the next game; it’s to win a championship. That’s why they draft, make trades, and run a training camp in the pre-season—so they can field a team with the best chance of going all the way. Once the season starts, it’s one game at a time. But each individual win is a small victory on the way to what will hopefully be a lot more success.
Parents and students often get so lost in the individual games during college planning season that they forget the goal of playing at all. The point of working hard in your AP bio class, giving your best on the softball team, and being a good kid who teachers enjoy having in class isn’t just to get those accolades. In fact—and this is important—it’s not even just to get into a good college. The point is to be a better educated human being, one who’s discovered some of your talents, and who’s learned to work well with others. That’s the glory worth seeking. The individual exams, grades, and other achievements are your one-game-at-a-times along that path. So are your college acceptances. But none of them is more important than the trophy of becoming a happy and successful adult.
When you remember the long-term goals of college planning, short-term mishaps seem less damaging. If you work like crazy in AP bio and just eek out a B, short-term focus means you’ll worry about how it will affect your GPA. Long-term focus lets you see that you’re probably smarter and better prepared for college academics because of it. The path to glory doesn’t demand that you be perfect (only one team in NFL history won every game on the way to winning the Super Bowl, and that was in 1972).
High school deserves to be taken seriously because you’re preparing for life that comes next, hopefully at a college that will make you happy. But one grade, test score, or missed opportunity isn’t sentencing you to a losing season. Work hard for and celebrate your individual victories. Learn from your failures and value the maturity and resilience that come with them. And remember that no matter what happens today, there will always be more games to be played (and your season lasts a lifetime).