So you’re ready to fitter, faster and stronger, eat better and improve the mental side of your game. You are going to train off the ice on a regular basis, work on your flexibility and warm-up before every ice session.

It’s great that you have these goals.  But, I have to warn you about something…
People will try to stop you from reaching the top of the female hockey world.

So in order to succeed, you need to be more than just physically tough. You have to be mentally tough.

The truth is that a lot of people don’t want you to reach the highest level, because if you make it (and they don’t), they’ll look bad.

While your teammates, coaches and parents should completely support you in reaching your hockey dreams, not everyone is going to understand your all-consuming desire to be the best.

To some of your “friends”, doing extra off-ice training, going to sleep early, and eating healthy is stupid.  It’s not fun, it’s not cool and it’s not what they want to do with their time.

So even though they don’t want you to fail, they are necessarily going to support you along your road to success.

While they are watching TV, going to the mall and spending all their extra time on line or on the phone, you are squeezing as much as you can into all 24 hours of the day so that you can become the best.

They’ll be happy for you when you succeed, but don’t expect that everyone is going to be your #1 supporter all the way until you get there.

If you do need to have everyone’s approval and support in order to motivate yourself to push yourself each and every day, then you’ll probably never make it to the top.

The road to the top of the female hockey world can be a lonely one.

When I was back in high school, I decided that I was going to get a hockey scholarship and become the best hockey player possible.  I realized that in order for this to happen, I would have to train every single day.  And that meant doing more than everyone else I was playing with and against.  If I wanted to stand out from the crowd, I couldn’t just do the same thing that everyone else was doing.  I had to work hard to separate myself from the pack.

And if that meant staying out for hours on the outdoor rink working on my skills, that’s what I was going to do.  If that meant missing a movie with my friends, so be it.  I was not willing to compromise my success on the ice for a night out with the girls.

Some of my friends didn’t get it.  My parents sometimes wondered if I was doing to much.  My coaches loved my work ethic, and wished they could get more of their players to do the same, but even they worried if I was going about things in the right way.

What everyone else thought didn’t really matter to me.  There were times when I felt all alone – but I knew that was the level of dedication I needed to be the best.  I was training to achieve my goal – not to win approval of others.

On the road to success, you have to stay true to who you are.

Just doing what everyone else does won’t get you to the top.

You can’t worry that your teammates will think your weird for doing some extra off-ice training after practice.  Don’t worry that your friends will think you are some kind of freak for ordering something healthy to eat when they are all eating deep-fried and sugar-filled food.

Go after what you want.  Do all of the little things (that very few other people are willing to do to) to be the best player possible.  Do something every day that moves you closer to your goals.

It may not make you popular – but it will make you successful.

And remember that you aren’t ever really alone on your journey to success.  With the support of the other players and coaches at Total Female Hockey, you will get all the help you need to get to the next level.

But when it all comes down to it, you, and you alone, are the one who controls have far you will get along the road to girls hockey success.

What are you going to do RIGHT NOW to move yourself one step closer to girls’ hockey greatness?  Don’t wait until tomorrow’s practice or even until after your game tonight.

What can you do immediately that will make you better?