The video has gone viral, but if you haven’t yet seen the under-two-minute floor routine of UCLA gymnast Katelyn Ohashi, may I suggest you do so now? https://www.inc.com/minda-zetlin/katelyn-ohashi-viral-video-ucla-gymnastics-ncaa.html. Rarely do we get to see such alignment with joy, with sharing one’s gifts with the world.
Katelyn was an Olympic hopeful. She beat Simone Biles to win the America Cup in 2013 before Biles went on to win an Olympic gold medal. Ohashi was expected to compete in 2016, but instead left the elite gymnastic world. Why? Not only did training and competition fracture her back and tear her shoulders, it broke her spirit. She was constantly told she wasn’t good enough, she didn’t look a certain way, and that she had gotten too big. At 13, she wrote that she was used to waking up with the taste of blood or iron in her mouth, as if she might almost throw up from being so hungry.
Katelyn left elite competition to compete instead in the college circuit. It was with her coach at UCLA that she rediscovered her joy, giving the world one of the best examples of what it looks like to be full-out love in motion.
Even more than the floor routine, which brings me to tears, is watching Katelyn after she finishes. She high-fives all of her teammates. The perfect 10 score appears—and watch what she does next. There’s no over-dramatization of the moment, as if her whole life has built to this crescendo of success. She hugs a friend and then stands in casual conversation with her colleagues, being fully present for the next moment. No ego. No theatrics. Just natural, calm, self-possessed and poised. I was stunned.
We’re so used to seeing athletes strive for perfection, for record-breaking, history-making victories. But what’s the lasting gift in relative perfection? A lifetime of remembering and reliving that single moment? A constant, relentless desire to one-up oneself? Perhaps a celebration of championship followed by a grace period of floating on air before the temporal dissipates, as it always does.
What I saw in Katelyn was the true genius of knowing all is in its right place—the routine, the body, the seemingly effortless effort, the music, the crowd, the playfulness, the rhythm, and the grounded joy that lasts a lifetime. This young woman appeared to have nothing to prove and nothing to lose. I imagine that’s why she was able to deliver such a performance.
No matter what you see when you watch Katelyn, there’s no doubt she landed more than a perfect score. She found an alignment of character, the grace of a true champion, and the freedom that comes with choosing the highest happiness.
Photo credit: Ben Liebenberg/AP