Has anyone made you feel completely devastated by your lack of accomplishments for your age yet today? No? Well maybe I can help — former Olympic gymnast McKayla Maroney is going to start making music now. That's right: First, an Olympic gymnast, now a musician... all at 20 years old. Feelin' real unaccomplished right about now, aren't you? What's more is that she apparently has plans to debut her first single in the next few months.
Yeah that's right, a gold medal-winning athlete already has her eye on the next field she wants to dominate, and she isn't even of drinking age yet. As you may recall, Maroney was a member of the United States Women's Gymnastics team in London in 2012, where she was awarded a gold medal in the team competition, and a silver in the vault — the latter of which inspired the McKayla Is Not Amused meme. Oh, yeah, she's also gone viral as a meme. What have you done lately or ever?
But even though you called your day a success after you made your bed this morning, then failed to shower or get out of your pajamas (just me?), Maroney isn't satisfied with all of her numerous achievements to date. After it became clear that she'd have to abandon her dreams of making it to the Olympics this year in Rio, Maroney set her sights on conquering the music industry instead, telling Seventeen :
You know, I really thought I was going to be there [in Rio]. Even six or seven months ago. But I ended up having some different health issues and I didn’t even realize that I was starting to fall out of love with the sport and in love with music. [...] I was a gymnast my whole life. I mean, I’d go to Starbucks and people would be like, ‘Are you going to the next Olympics?’ And when I’d say no, they’d literally look sad. So it was very hard for me to get excited about anything else. I thought that I had to do gymnastics forever. To be excited about this new piece of myself and this new part of my life is very special for me.
It seems like it was actually pretty fortuitous timing, because Maroney got out before she started to actively dislike her love, gymnastics. It's like ending a relationship early enough that the breakup can still be amicable and you two can get along if your paths ever cross in the future. And it puts her in a great headspace to start things up with the new special someone in her life — music — and get in touch with what it feels like to have that spark again.
Maroney says she's spent the last year or so just getting in touch with her music lovin' side, and figuring out what she likes — and now she's hoping to have a single out "in the next couple of months."
I’ve loved writing songs since I was really young. I thought I was going to be like Sia and sell my songs to people. But after they were done, I was like, ‘I’m not going to sell these to anybody! I want to sing them.’ I have some demos done and I’m going to be showing them to some bigger people in the industry and we’ll see where that takes me.
Sounds like she's on a great track, and if her previous record of... um... literal world domination is any indicator, Maroney is going to be successful at pretty much anything and everything she decides to work toward. Can't wait to hear what she comes up with!
Never forget:
Image: Giphy
