Everyone of us have had a moment along our path where something swallowed us up. Time, fear, doubt and ourselves are the usual suspects. We can take ourselves out of a situation quickly for many reasons.
I’ve often heard the reference of a practice player vs a game player. A player will stand out in practice do everything to get the attention of coaches and then when the lights turn on at the game they get swallowed up. The plays they have been routinely making are nowhere to be seen. They let fear, doubt and themselves take away everything they have been working for. The fear of failure, the fear of letting others down and the fear of do I really belong here can take over. They often forget what got them to this point is being themselves. We try to be everything but ourselves all to often.
Being swallowed up is not isolated to sports, putting on the adult hat brings challenges that often times feels like your walking in quicksand. You have responsibilities at work, at home, if you’re a parent not to mention the details of trying to wear multiple hats. We often utter the phrase “real quick”, albeit to do a lot of things. As I’ve learned, often times the hard way very few things are “real quick”. I tried to mow “real quick” last night some property in our neighborhood. This resulted in hitting a rock, bending a blade and a busted gas line. I got swallowed up by something that should have taken a short amount of time to something that took over four hours to get to a point of where I still have to do more work. Now I’m in the time aspect of having to be several places over the next few days.
What typically happens in these situations? We put something on a back burner and leave it to move to something else, an issue arises there and that cycle continues. Before we know it we are knee deep with items on the back burner and still trying to move forward. We get swallowed up. We try to have an answer to every question. We think we know the answer to the, Why did this happen? The part that most of us struggle with is, we don’t always have the answer. We will fail. We will fail often. We are going to run into obstacles. Adulting is hard. Parenting is hard. Being a teenager is hard. Life is hard. We have to learn to not let ourselves be the obstacle. Hardtimes help mound us. Be a grower. Be a learner.
For every dark night there’s a bright light in the morning. For every rain, there’s a rainbow. Don’t let fear, doubt or yourself stop you from being you. We are going to get swallowed up. The task now is making those times less and less. Know that “real quick” is nowhere close to what it should be. If you practice it, play it the same. Be the same person in both scenarios.
Enjoy your day!
TCB