Becoming a cat...

"Spend days on a rail and you'll become a cat..."

I am sure you have wondered before why some basketball players are better than others, why some succeed and some don't, why some players become professional athletes and some will never leave the walls of a rec center. 

Unfortunately there's no simple answer to that. A big aspect of becoming successful is psychology which I'm not going to go into - there are a lot of players who perform great in practice yet get burnt when it comes to competing...

Nevertheless, this post is about becoming a cat. In order to become one you need to start living like one. In order to become a professional athlete you need to start living like one as well.

As trivial as it sounds, not a lot of people understand it. To a professional athletes sports is a profession, just like an accountant spends 40 hours a week at the desk, professional athlete spends 40+ hours mastering their craft, or going through recovery.

Becoming a professional athlete isn't easy. Going through constant physical pain of training constantly trying to increase our limits,  dealing with injuries, as well as dealing with people who still don't understand that sports can be your full time job is really discouraging and a lot people simply quit as soon as they stumble upon their first obstacle. 

Training 40 hours a week for a youth athlete is a little extreme, but being able to work on your athletic abilities 2 hours a day 6 days a week should be your life. Making 150-200 shots, playing against your shadow for 30 minutes, followed by playing 1 on 1, 2 on 2 or 3 on 3 should be your new daily norm.

"If you want to become a cat, spend days on a rail", if you want to become a basketball player do what the pros do - work!