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"I've never known anybody to 

achieve anything without 

overcoming adversity."

-Lou Holtz

ME AND MY BIG 

GOALS

By Joseph DiNobile

I was born in Washington state. My dad was in 

the navy, so I moved all around the country, 

from Rhode Island to Washington, DC, and now 

Minnesota. It's fun to see the country, but my 

only problem is that, whenever I make friends, I 

have to move to some other place and make 

friends all over again. That's the kind of 

adversity I don't want to overcome, and yet, it's 

the kind of adversity I have had to overcome 

multiple times. When I have a family of my own, 

I intend to stay in one place until my kids go to 

college.

Sports have always been a big thing of mine. I 

love watching sports, reading about sports, 

and especially playing sports. One of my goals 

is to play on a travel team, like baseball or 

basketball. I believe that I have a lot of 

potential, and I just have to let it loose 

somehow. Unfortunately, some of my coaches 

have kept me on the bench because I'm not as 

good as some of the other players. Well, that 

makes no sense. How am I supposed to get 

better if I don't get the chance to play?

As Lou Holtz, a former football coach, once 

said, "I've never seen anybody to achieve 

anything without overcoming adversity." I'm in 

adversity right now, but I'll overcome adversity 

and show everybody just how good of an 

athlete I can be. I will do this through hard 

work and persistence. Maybe someday, I'll 

write a book about this, about how some kid 

has to ride the pine (sit on the bench) because 

he wasn't good enough, and he has to make 

an opportunity for himself if he wants to make 

a name for himself.

Of course, life isn't all peaches and cream. I 

have to overcome challenges and adversity, 

just like Lou Holtz said. When I took 10,000 

shots last summer, I became a better 

basketball player. In order to get to summer 

vacation, I had to take all of those final tests, 

which required hours of studying and going 

over and waiting. That's probably the hardest 

kind of adversity I ever had to overcome.

I may have lived in several places in America, but the 

one place I would want to stay for the rest of my life 

(and the one place I've never lived in) is Detroit. I'm 

a fan of all the Detroit sports teams there, and they 

have this event called the Woodward Dream Cruise 

where a lot of old muscle cars and exotic cars take a 

slow drive down Woodward Avenue. Life in Detroit, 

though, is rough. Unemployment rates are high and 

you have to work hard to get a job, and, even then, 

you might not get it. If I live in Detroit for the rest of 

my life, I will have to work hard to get a job or, if that 

doesn't work (no pun intended), I will overcome that 

adversity by starting a company of my own.

Video games are one of my other great 

interests. My mom tells me to do only half an 

hour, but I would want to play for an hour, 

maybe two, if I wanted to. I waste time by 

doing it. But, even when I play video games, 

I'm   overcoming adversity. When my Xbox 360 

crashes or I lose in the video game, I get 

frustrated, but this is the video game's way of 

teaching me patience.

I would do anything for 

my dad (no offense, 

mom). My dad is a 

hard-working person 

who has served for 

almost 30 years in the 

military. He taught me 

how to play sports and 

be tough in an 

important situation, 

but, most important of 

all, he taught me how 

to do my best and 

overcome adversity 

through hard work and 

persistence.

I have big dreams. Big goals. The only way I 

can achieve these goals is to overcome 

adversity, just like Lou Holtz said.

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