Setting goals

There are a lot of warnings about people meeting their heroes. How their expectations often fall far short of the reality.

Over the weekend, we had the opportunity to meet and hear from U.S. Olympic gold medalist curler John Shuster.

We were in Rice Lake with my son Alex for a curling camp. While he was busy with drills and strategy development sessions, Kim and I were busy doing touristy stuff around the area, just relaxing and enjoying the chance to get away for a muchneeded break and cheering him on. Shuster was also at Rice Lake last weekend, this time on the warming room side of the ice watching his own sons take part in the same summer curling camp Alex was at. They were in the younger age group at the camp, although there was a lot of overlap and interaction.

On Sunday, Shuster brought out his Olympic medals, and took some time to talk with the young people at the camp about his journey in the sport and the importance of setting goals. Students in the camp ranged in age from middle school up through high school, all of whom had grown up watching the highs and lows of Shuster’s career.

I will fully admit to being awed by getting a chance to meet one of the truly great players in the game and it is just super cool to be able to hold an Olympic gold medal. I have no illusions about making it onto the medal podium of any sport so I figure that was my only chance. As Alex pointed out the medal weighs significantly more than his curling broom does.

More important than being able to gawk at his medals and get pictures with a sports superstar, Shuster shared a message of the need for setting goals and working to make those goals a reality even when you might want to give up.

Shuster recalled that as a young teenager he attended a curling clinic in Eau Claire.

As he sat shivering in the bleachers over the arena ice, he listened to a former Olympic curler tell about how his goal had been to represent the United States at the Olympics. Shuster recalled the older curler telling the group of aspiring athletes about regretting not setting the goal to be on the medal podium, otherwise he feels he could have achieved that goal as well.

Shuster talked of his own journey as part of national championship teams playing with whoever would have him and of being on the U.S. Olympic team that took bronze in Turino, Italy in 2006 only to do poorly in the 2010 and 2014 games before coming back to win gold in 2018. In the 2022 games his team missed the medal stand coming in at fourth place.

Shuster noted that goal setting is only one part of the equation with the other being the willingness to do the work to make the goal a reality. He talked about how his team, filled with arguably some of the best players ever to play the sport, is making changes in such game fundamentals as sweeping in order to remain competitive at the national and international level.

There is a sad trend among many people to want to be excellent at something right away. They imagine life should be like a race car where you go from 0 to 100 mph in mere seconds. While there are those who are naturally gifted in any sport or activity, the reality is that it takes hard work to succeed at any level, especially when you are at your lowest depths. Many would simply give up at that point, and few would judge them harshly for it.

If there is a defining line between those who are good and those who are truly great and who will leave a lasting legacy, it is in being able to climb out of that hole and do the work needed and maintain the vision and goals to be the best.

Odds are pretty good that somewhere in that group of youngsters hearing Shuster’s words will be someone who dreams of glory and has the drive to make that dream a reality.

Brian Wilson is News Editor at The Star News.