<#289 Desk Column>

Challenge Yourself: It’s Worth It!

By Lim Seon-hye, Head Student Editor

 Two weeks have passed since the 2010 Winter Olympic Games Closing Ceremony was held in Vancouver, Canada. As you know, Korea achieved good results in this Olympic Games. I am very interested in sports, so I watched almost every event in which Korean teams competed. This Olympic Games reminded me of the words, “The world only remembers those that come first.” from one of the most popular TV comedy shows. Many people know the medalists in such events as Figure skating, Short track speed skating and Speed skating. However, few know that Korea’s four-men bobsleigh team participated in this Olympics for the first time and finished fourth driving in it and 19th overall. Do you know what I felt watching the bobsleigh event?

 Challenge is meaningful in itself. There is no an athlete who participates in the Olympic Games without a struggle. Every athlete has worked hard for years to become an Olympic entrant. They do not know if they will win. They can only exert great efforts and do their best by minimizing their mistakes. In my opinion, we are all similar to these athletes. We sometimes give up too easily when we face difficult situations in our life. When we have little possibility to obtain a good result, we rarely challenge ourselves to achieve it. But challenge, whether the results are good or not, is meaningful in itself. No one can assure the result of the challenges we take on. If you do not challenge yourself, however, you will not gain anything. If you do challenge yourself, you will still learn something even though you fail to reach your aim.

 I think I am a settler rather than an adventurist. Looking back, there are so many things I regret in my life because I did not challenge myself. It is not a matter of ‘right or wrong’ but a matter of ‘do or do not’. My regret comes from this; I should have taken on a challenge even though I was not guaranteed success, but I did not. As a Chonnam Tribune reporter, I sometimes had a very hard time when facing some problems like these; writing articles in English, working with other reporters and so on. But one thing is obvious, hard times are much more valuable to us than easy times. Watching the Korean bobsleigh team during this winter Olympic Games, I realized that challenges are very important. It was a brilliant performance. Do you hesitate to take on challenges? Are you afraid of being a loser? There is an old saying ‘better to do than not to do’. Challenge yourself! You won’t regret it.