Hey Everyone,

I hope everyone had a good day, and accomplished most of if not all of what they were trying to accomplish. This morning when I woke up I saw a great question that prompted what I am going to write about. Tonight I am going to write about how important time management has been to my success.

Through out college, one of my biggest struggles was being able to manage my health in combination with schooland track. People who participated in a sport during college understand the demands of being a collegiate athlete. As athletes, we have to go to class, practice, lift weights, attend athletic meetings, study for exams, and compete on a high level. In addition to having to do that I had to manage my asthma. At the time it didn’t occurred to me that rest was the important piece I was missing, because in college rest can be hard to come by and as athletes being exhausted was part of the game. For most athletes it doesn’t take as big of a toll on them as it did on me. In my opinion, I was pretty organized and managed my time fairly well given the circumstances, in part due to my academic coordinator who helped me with time management. However, I was not able to manage the stress of being a student athlete and getting enough rest, which made it difficult for me to manage my health. Most of the time when people think of needing rest it’s to help stay physically healthy, to allow their body to heal and recover, but I needed it to keep my asthma under control. It wasn’t until my junior or senior year that we correlated my asthma attacks with the stress and demands of school and athletics. We began to notice that my asthma gave me the most problems when I introduced exams and competitions to my already hectic and demanding schedule. I was getting less sleep and everything was getting more intense. So although I was managing my time as best I could, the combination of everything made it difficult for me to control my asthma. There was one time that I went to the ER two nights in one week due to asthma attacks.

After I graduated, I really learned how to manage my athletics and asthma by paying close attention to my body, when it was exhausted, and the amount of stress I was placing on it. Then after I figured out how I needed to manage my time with athletics I introduced school back into the equation and now I have been able to do everything that I need to do for my sport, and take a few classes. Thus far I haven’t had any problems with my asthma; in fact the doctor that I am working with is impressed with how under control it is giving my history and the struggles I have had with it. Through my journey I have learned that to be successful I need to manage all aspects of my life, my health, my sport, my academics, and my social life because who can be successful in choas.

My recommendation for others, who are trying to be successful, is being organized and balancing what you do with all aspects of your life is key.

xoxo MacKenzie

View Original Post at mackenziesjourney.com | View MacKenzie's Full Profile

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• Track & Field, Sports

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Jimmyv414 says:

I have followed the career and education path of Mackenzie since her days in High School Track. I have seen her experience set backs due to her health and other physical injuries. What I have always been most impressed with is her resiliance and her insatiable appetite to be the best at whatever she has decided to take on in her life. I recall at a meet in Northern CA, she was experiencing an asthma attack, but instead of just bowing out (which most would have done), she told me she just ran her race holding her breath and then dealt with the consequences after the race was over. It is examples like this that demonstrated her committment to excellence. It is also experiences like this that makes what she says about finding a balance in life even more relevant because she has used these experiences to grow and share with the rest of the world, which will undoudtedly help another young athlete or anyone attempting to be the best at whatever they do, to better manage the stresses, adversity and challenges of life, and come out of those experience as a WINNER-Just Like MacKenzie Hill. Bravo.

Tuesday, January 11, 2011 at 4:54pm EST