Road to Vegas Day 4: Just Breathe

4 days left, in the middle finally! I yet again didn’t get much done outside of research. I’m to the point of seclusion, thus today’s lesson…
Stress management.
I’m a worry wart, I stress over everything. During my competition season I literally don’t eat on Fridays because the stress makes me sick. I get shakey and really irritable and tired when I’m stressed. And let me tell you that this is one of those situations. I still have half a week and already I’m finding it hard to eat and concentrate on anything but possible failure.
I know I shouldn’t be worried, I mean even if I don’t seem like it I am pretty well prepared. And unlike a lot of the kids competing, I’ve done this before…twice actually (congress in Dallas 2 years ago, and Extemp last year in Kansas). But anyways, I’m freaking out about it. I feel like it’s now or never and all I can see is me not doing well.
Despite all this uncontrollable, at the moment, stress I have realized something. My stress is a huge hindrance to progress. When I worry about things like this it’s all I focus on. I lose touch with my real goals. I worry just about how not to fail instead of how to truly succeed, trust me there is a difference. And that got me thinking, what if our leaders were like this? What would happen to America and the world?
I want to be a leader, I want to make the world better. So, I guess I’m left with 2 options: I sit back and watch as the world evolves maybe for the best or maybe not without my input, or I learn how to suck it up and get over this stress. I know the second one is what I need to be doing, but I’m not exactly sure how.
I’ve heard all the traditional remedies, take deep breaths, count to ten, blah blah blah. Yeah it doesn’t work. So, any suggestions before I decide to lock myself in the room and never come out?
I’m off to bed, I have a long hard day of research ahead of me. Stay tuned.