Clarity of Vision – Where Performance Really Begins
I have set goals for as long as I can remember. Some worked out. Some didn’t. Over time, I realised that clarity of vision isn’t about controlling the outcome. It’s about committing fully to a direction and allowing the journey to shape you in ways you don’t always expect.
One of my first real experiences of this came at 18, during the transition from junior to senior athlete.
I set a clear goal: to compete at the Senior World Championships the following year. At the time, that step felt huge. I remember a coach from another club telling me I wasn’t ready. Strangely, that didn’t knock my confidence. It lit something in me. But the real shift happened when I said the goal out loud to my own coach. Once it was spoken, it felt real, and I owned it.
From that point on, everything became more intentional. Training wasn’t just about working hard. It was about working with purpose. I started monitoring sessions and results, making small changes to my daily routine so I had the energy to train twice a day. Nothing dramatic. Just consistent, deliberate adjustments guided by a clear sense of where I wanted to go.
Clarity didn’t guarantee success. It gave direction to my effort, and that changed everything.
When the Goal Doesn’t Work Out
Not every goal ends the way you plan.
After the 2004 Athens Olympics, where I made the finals, I came home proud but hungry for more. I wanted to push on and improve on that performance at the 2008 Beijing Games. That became the next big target. What I didn’t expect was how hard it would be at times to find the same level of motivation. The Olympic blues are real. You spend years building toward one moment, and when it’s over, even a successful result can leave a strange emptiness. Re‑igniting that fire took work.
Qualifying for the Beijing Olympics became a four‑year commitment, a long-term plan built around daily training, competition cycles, and constant refinement. When it didn’t happen, the disappointment hit hard. I felt like I let myself and my team down, and it took time to sit with that feeling and understand it.
But what mattered in the long run was what stayed with me from that pursuit: the standards, the discipline, the resilience, and the ability to adapt when the path shifts beneath your feet.
As part of that longer transition, I joined Cirque du Soleil earlier than planned. I didn’t arrive empty-handed. I brought a skillset shaped by years of chasing Olympic-level goals, along with a mindset forged under pressure. The vision changed; the commitment didn’t.
The First Days on Stage
I still remember my first day of training with Cirque du Soleil.
There were a lot of familiar faces, people I competed against, all navigating their own transitions out of sport. What surprised me most was the space itself. The stage didn’t look how I had imagined it. It was bigger, brighter, more open, almost overwhelming at first.
And suddenly, this wasn’t an individual pursuit anymore.
I stepped into a team act where timing, trust, and awareness of others mattered just as much as technical ability. Large parts of the act depended on people being exactly where they said they would be, doing exactly what they trained to do. Your margin for error wasn’t just your own anymore.
That shift was immediate. Clarity of vision now meant understanding my role within something bigger. The goal wasn’t to outperform anyone. It was to deliver the same standard, together, every night.
Enjoying the Journey (Without Pretending It’s Easy)
People often talk about “sacrifice,” but I never really experienced it that way. I was exactly where I wanted to be. The journey felt alive, demanding at times, yes, but full of moments that reminded me why I loved what I was doing. There was a real sense of momentum, of waking up each day knowing I was building toward something that mattered to me.
Some people see sacrifice as restriction, not going out, not doing what others are doing. But when you’re aligned with a bigger goal, those choices don’t feel like sacrifices at all. They feel like decisions that support where you’re trying to go.
What carried me through wasn’t motivation alone. Motivation is great when it’s there, but it’s unreliable. What made the difference were the rhythms I built: the consistency, the habits, the small daily wins that stacked up over time. And just as importantly, the people around me. Coaches, teammates, and later fellow performers, people who understood the environment, who held the same standards, who made the hard days lighter and the good days even better.
There was joy in that. Not the loud, celebratory kind. More the quiet satisfaction of doing the work, of seeing progress, of sharing the experience with people who were on the same path. Those lessons followed me from sport onto the stage, and they’ve stayed with me long after.
Why I Still Set Big Goals
I still believe in setting big goals.
Not because they always come true. They don’t.
But because they give shape to your days and meaning to the work.
Sometimes you reach the goal.
Sometimes you don’t, but you end up somewhere unexpected, carrying more with you than you realise.
For me, clarity of vision has never been about certainty.
It’s been about direction, commitment, and finding a way to enjoy the journey while giving everything you’ve got.
What’s Next
Clarity gave me direction, but it wasn’t enough on its own.
What sustained me, in sport and on stage, was consistency: turning up, repeating the basics, and delivering under pressure. And just as importantly, the people around me, the trust, timing, and shared responsibility that make performance possible.
Those are the lessons I’ll explore in the next two articles.
If you’re on a similar path and want to talk more about it, I’m always open to connecting on LinkedIn.
A former Olympic gymnast for Team GB and later an Olympic National Coach, Gary has guided athletes through the intensity, discipline, and joy of elite sport. His career then expanded into the creative world of Cirque du Soleil, where he performed and coached internationally, blending athletic precision with artistry, teamwork, and world-class showmanship.
Today, Gary brings that rare combination of high-performance insight, creative leadership, and community-focused development into his work across sport, education, and local partnerships. As a Sports Development Strategist, he designs inclusive programmes that help young people build confidence, resilience, and a sense of belonging — from large-scale events to grassroots club initiatives.
Whether he’s coaching performers, supporting emerging leaders, or shaping community sport experiences, Gary’s approach is rooted in three principles learned over a lifetime in high-performance environments:
Clarity of Vision - Define your goals with clear precision.
Consistency- Build habits and routines that compound into extraordinary results.
The team around you - Cultivate deep trust and collaboration that amplifies individual and collective performance.
Driven by a passion for helping people grow whether on stage, on the field, or in their community, Gary continues to champion environments where everyone feels supported to step forward, try something new, and discover what they love.
Editor's Note: At StageLync, an international platform for the performing arts, we celebrate the diversity of our writers' backgrounds. We recognize and support their choice to use either American or British English in their articles, respecting their individual preferences and origins. This policy allows us to embrace a wide range of linguistic expressions, enriching our content and reflecting the global nature of our community.
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