Wait. I have to WORK?!

It's Kate again. It's a Thursday night and I've finished my work day (including a petting zoo and county fair exhibits at a nursing home...), gone to the gym, made dinner, cleaned the kitchen, and finally settled in for the night. Like any good early-twenty-something-year-old, I got comfortable and looked at Pinterest.

I don't know about you, but I love Pinterest for a variety of uses. I have a board that I use to pin new ideas for work at my nursing home. I have a board for dream food creations. I have a board for dream outfits that I hope to one day wear. DIY, Summer Camp, and my Perfect Wedding all have a place, too.

But my board with the most pins recently is my Health & Fitness board. I started scanning this board tonight because my work out today was brutal. I saw definite improvement from the last time I did this set of exercises. It's all core and legs -- if you don't do a lot of resistance training, that's what wipes you out at the end of the day because upper body is nothing. And at one point my trainer had to look at me and say "Kate - don't you dare quit on me. Don't quit on yourself." And I pushed through a set of squats and spidermans that made every muscle in my upper legs burn as though a wildfire was spreading through them.

But I finished. And he smiled and said, "Good work!"before giving me a high five. In that moment, I wished that I could just be done and that the work I had already put in was enough. But afterwards, I saw this:

I worked hard today in more ways than one. And I need to remember that wishes don't need to come true -- hard work and perseverance will make my journey possible. I hope that whatever you wish for in life, you can work hard and find that you reap those benefits. Because it feels awesome to push to the end and know that you can do what you once wished for because it seemed impossible. I don't wish I could summit Pikes Peak...I will train and put in the work so that I can summit Pikes Peak!