Peter Vidmar, a Mormon, likes to quote a former leader of his church, Spencer W. Kimball. President Kimball’s motto was “Do it.” Peter Vidmar says if you want your dreams to come true, you can’t just dream about them—you have to get to work and make them come true.

He explains that the margin of victory is often very, very small:

“Let’s realize what the margin of victory was in a few of the events in last summer’s Olympics. In women’s cycling, after the 79.2-kilometer race, the difference between the gold medalist and the silver medalist at the finish line was just the length of a tire. In a pressure-packed swimming relay, the difference between the first-place team and second-place team was only .04 of a second. In many of the gymnastics competitions, the difference between first place and second place was as minute as .025 of a point.

The champions didn’t win by running twice as fast, by jumping twice as far, or by scoring twice as many points as their opponents. In many cases they won by just a fraction of a second, a fraction of an inch, or a fraction of a point. Likewise, and more important, the champions didn’t win by training twice as hard as their opponents. If another gymnast trains six hours a day, I can’t train twelve hours a day. Twelve hours a day in a gym just isn’t healthy! But I can train six hours and fifteen minutes a day. This is where giving it that little extra and going the extra mile makes the difference.” (Peter Vidmar, “Pursuing Excellence,” Ensign, May 1985, 38.)

He advises people to work at everything they do just a little longer—even just fifteen minutes a day more will add up to more than 91 hours a year of extra training and can make the difference between success and failure.

Next, he reminds listeners to not give up. Success isn’t always smooth or consistent. There will be days when nothing seems to be going well, or when we get discouraged, but if we give up, we can’t possibly succeed. Instead, just keep working away at it, little by little.

He teaches that intermediate goals are important, but equally important is to set a really high top goal. He aimed for the Olympics even when he hadn’t started winning local competitions, because it made him work that much harder—not hard enough to win the next local competition, but hard enough to win the Olympics. This meant he worked harder than the others, who were only focused on the next contest.

Finally, he encourages his listeners to hold on to their moral standards. He tells a story of being handed a large cup filled with wine. Each winner was supposed to drink from the cup and pass it on. He explained he wouldn’t do it—not even just a sip—because he was Mormon. They insisted he take the cup when it was passed to him, so he did, but he only held it high and then passed it on. The audience laughed at him for refusing to drink, but, even though he was a little embarrassed, he was also proud to realize how easy it had been for him to not give in to pressure to lower his standards.

Read Peter Vidmar’s complete article on Pursuing Excellence.

Torah isn’t afraid to tell reporters she doesn’t drink or smoke, or even drink coffee, and that she is not going to become sexually active until she’s married. She even explained she wanted a Mormon boyfriend who shares her beliefs, and she found this in Jake Welch, an American snowboarder who is also a Mormon. When asked how she would celebrate a win, she cheerfully said water was her celebration drink of choice.

Torah said, “”I have strong beliefs and they never waver. (The gospel) keeps me grounded and gives me purpose to what I am doing. I think the way we believe as Latter-day Saints is amazing, especially in the world today” (Torah Bright Wins Gold Medal, LDS Newsroom Blog.)

Torah is a great example to teenagers who are being made fun of for their standards or who are being told they need to be immoral to be popular. She is beautiful, talented, and popular and she’s done it all without sacrificing her beliefs. She’s proof that the world is lying when it says you have to lower your standards to make it in the world.

Sure, it’s easier to be different when you’re famous, but Torah hasn’t been famous all her life. She made the commitment to her standards long before sponsors were desperate to sign her. Her past choices, made before she knew how things would turn out, are important now, because once you’re famous, everyone starts searching for the scandals in your past. Torah’s lifelong choice to be moral is paying off now, as it does for everyone who chooses Jesus over the world.