How Writing is Like American Ninja Warrior

Last week, an amazing thing happened: I became a VIP author for Stitched Smile Publications. I get some perks with that title, but the best of them is being part of an amazing team of authors that supports and encourages one another and others. I’m honored and excited to be part of that.

One of the other perks of becoming a VIP author included doing an interview. While answering questions, I was taken back to the very beginning of my writing career and talked about some of the things that made me who I am. One of those was the fact that in college, I had some professors who were less than supportive of my writing. In fact, they shattered my confidence, causing me to give up writing for several years.

I’m going to be honest: I haven’t thought about this incident for a long time. And why would I? It’s painful and difficult—and there’s no reason to live in the past. I’ve grown so much since that time, and I’ve accomplished a lot.

But at the same time, I can’t deny that the incident had an impact on my life and helped form who I am. But so did good things, like my friend who encouraged me to try writing again. Without her, I definitely wouldn’t be where I am today.

As I was thinking about all the incidents that came together to get me to where I am today, I started thinking about American Ninja Warrior and The Voice.

My family and I love American Ninja Warrior. The boys often try to imitate the ninjas and develop their own obstacle courses in the house. When we lived in Wyoming, they would even spider crawl up the insides of door jambs.

I love watching the ninjas overcome the obstacles and how strong the women warriors are becoming. They are carving out their place in the sport, and it’s amazing to watch them make history.

If you’ve ever watched American Ninja Warrior, you know that a lot of the athletes get a segment before their run where they talk about the life obstacles they had to overcome to get to that moment in time. The same thing happens on The Voice. The contestants talk about what happened to get them to the moment before they step onto the stage to sing.

And most of the time, those obstacles were difficult, full of heartache, and could have stopped them from moving forward.

I’m fully aware that part of the reason these are shown is to make the contestants relatable and sympathetic. I don’t doubt that the TV producers carefully pick and choose which stories they are going to highlight to get the most viewers’ attention. Whatever the motive/process behind the stories is, you can’t deny one thing: life is tough.

But we all know this, right? We know that life isn’t a walk in the park and that we don’t get things handed to us on a silver platter. Everyone on those shows, I don’t doubt even the stories we don’t see, had to overcome something to get where they are. They had to put in the time, effort, and work to see their dreams come to fruition. They suffered for their art, whether it’s singing or running an obstacle course.

And once they get onto the stage or to the course, there’s no guarantee that they’ll be successful. There’s no guarantee they’ll turn the judges’ chairs or push the buzzer at the end. But they don’t let that minor detail stop them. And if they don’t turn a chair or reach the end, they use the moment to learn. They go back to the gym or the studio and work on the things that are going to make them better.

As a writer, I’m not much different. I face my own obstacles and judges every time I put words on a page or publish a book. If I fail, I use the moment to learn and to work on the things that are going to make me better.

If I’ve learned anything from American Ninja Warrior and The Voice it’s that the world doesn’t cut anyone any slack. It doesn’t care if we succeed or fail, and it will do all it can to throw obstacles in our way. We have to find a way to overcome them to reach our goals.
Pembroke Sinclair's books on Goodreads
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