Picking Up the Pieces

I recently took a sabbatical from writing, one in which I had no choice in the matter.  After exercising one night I walking to my vehicle, The Silver Steed (SS), as I normally would. I was tired, my coach had just made me run 5 miles all at one time, and if you’ve read my previous entry you know that I am not, nor ever will be about that life.

As I was returning a friend’s call, I hopped in and began the habitual process of starting my car. I was going to drink my recovery shake, chop it up on the phone, go get groceries, and probably catch up on Arrow afterwards (because it was Wednesday).

Everything was normal.

Suddenly, my keen peripheral vision caught site of papers hanging out of my glove compartment. My eyes leaped from the open glove compartment, to its contents strewn across the front seat – I simultaneously heard a rustle of the wind – synchronously my vestibulo-occular reflex turned my head to the back seat where behold! – SS’s starboard back window was nowhere to be found.

It was at this moment that an expletive may or may not have bellowed from deep within me, while my friend exclaimed, “AGAIN!?” Yes, again bro! Dread ripened in the pit of my stomach and metastasized over me in a cephalic to caudal manner as I bolted out of the car to check the contents of my back seat. My ergonomically friendly messenger bag with my most important belongings was no longer there.

Years of work, meaningful gifts, and my identity were all gone. Just like that, and there was absolutely nothing that I could do in that moment to get them back. I was shocked, disheartened, alone, and violated. So is the life of man sometimes, right?

In my reflections of the matter in the following hours, days, and now several weeks – I’ve accepted the fact that it was just stuff (which by the way, is a great conclusion to allow someone to come to in their own time), but it has been difficult to deal with the ramifications that this act of thievery has placed on my mind.

You see, my mind works by placing events and feelings together in a conglomerate that scaffolds together. And like a fictitious spider web, if you strum one cord, the rest of the lattice hums along with it.

Questions that clouded my mind like The Riddler to Bruce Wayne:

How do you pick up the pieces [of glass]? How do you not worry about what you will eat for dinner because you have no money? How do you walk to SS now without feeling as though she has been dismantled? How do you not worry in general? How do you not worry about your grandpa’s ever-increasing dementia? How do you move past your feelings of inadequacy? How do you deal with not getting into that school? How do you deal with he/she continuing to blot you out of their life? Am I still going to want to do this job in a decade?

Am I still talking about myself? When the fourth wall breaks...

Emotional baggage can weigh heavily on the mind, but that doesn’t mean it should take a metaphorical tumble off of a cliff.

I’m reminded that I only hold the reins on my own actions, and that this bridle is nominal when it comes to other people or the workings of this world. I’m reminded that I should back up my computer a little bit more frequently. I’m reminded that I don’t know what tomorrow holds for myself, or SS, but I know Who holds tomorrow.

Why Must We Always Be Running?

A cold sense of dread originates in the pit of my stomach and its tendrils spread in all cardinal planes as my sympathetic nervous system increases my blood pressure and heart rate – I have to run, again. My [hate]/hate relationship with ambulation that involves both feet leaving the earth began in whichever grade required the first “Presidential Fitness Test.”

This archaic fitness examination was a sure-fire way to separate the adolescent lions from the lambs. The test included a push-up, shuttle run, sit-up, sit-n-reach, and mile run component. The sit-n-reach was my JAM, while everything else was meh cause…well ya see – I was a hefty child.

As time and my perception of fitness has changed my mind, body and outcomes of these particular tests, a strong Pavlovian response remains when I see running on that whiteboard. Few things (except deadlifts) make me question capabilities more so than running.

I will never forget Gimli’s line in Lord of The Rings: The Two Towers, when the famous trio sets out in search of their Hobbit friends for the umpteenth time and he proclaims in his thick dwarfish accent, “Why must we always be running!?” I feel you bro. TRUST.

Gimli (in The Two Towers) shouts, “Keep breathing, that’s the key. Breathe.” Dr. Wells (in every episode of The Flash) coolly throws out a “Run Barry, Run!” And Paul (1 Corinthians 9:26) tells the members of the church to run with intent, not like a chicken with their head cut-off.

Three perspectives, one goal. Chances are they will all duel within your heart.

See I tend to be an out-of-breathe dwarf respiring heavily through my beard, only thinking of how far away the finish line is. My legs grow heavy, and I just start running with all calves – essentially allowing my center of mass to move backwards, rather than forwards.

It’s important to have those Dr. Wells’ in your inner circle to tell you to keep running, stop looking backwards, and move forward. I don’t know where I’d be without those who keep me accountable, or have the ability to fix my over inverted calcaneus causing me to limp through this life – hindering me from scaling the obstacles (i.e. metahumans) that so easily try to take hold of my timeline.

But the ultimate responsibility is upon ourselves, to guard what we must to allow ourselves to continue forward. From a physical standpoint, you must condition your body. From a soulful standpoint, you must guard your heart and not give it away so freely (I have a much more difficult time with the latter).

Regardless of your background King Solomon was one of the wisest men to walk this earth. His practical advice is given in Proverbs 4: A Father’s Wise Instruction (v. 12, 23-27):

“When you walk, your step will not be hampered, and if you run, you will not stumble. Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life. Put away from you crooked speech, and put devious talk far from you. Let your eyes look directly forward, and your gaze be straight before you. Ponder the path of your feet; then all your ways will be sure. Do not swerve to the right or to the left; turn your foot away from evil.”

I remind myself the interrogative: What am I running away from? What am I running towards?

Luke Cage reminds me the declarative: “Forward always, always forward.” 

When Your Good Isn't Good Enough

As a Tiger fan sitting in Death Valley this past weekend for the LSU vs. Alabama exhibition, the game did not finish with the outcome that myself, or any other one of the 100K+ fans that filled the ranks of the stadium’s bleachers, suites, and nosebleed sections expected. With LSU not closing with a victory since 2011, I found myself questioning, “When will they ever be good enough?” During the somber walk back to the car, I found this question hovering over many aspects of my life.

Photo from The Advertiser

I have always struggled with thoughts of not being good enough, not being good enough in relationships, athletics, academics, etc. In the same way that LSU ran their race with BAMA up until the final 5 minutes before every Tiger fan let out a collective sigh of disappointment in acceptance of impending defeat, I was acutely aware of how I’ve never been the very best [like no one ever was]. I was reminded of my singleness, my “ok” fitness abilities, and how I didn’t necessarily get into my first choice of school. It was a very raw and grounding wave of emotions.

Considering my Christianity, it would be SUPER helpful if I dropped an encouraging verse like Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and future…” right!? Some Christians tend to forget about the context of this verse, and how the whole reason Jeremiah was receiving this message from The Lord was because the whole of Israel was being a huge, disobedient-gnarwhale, towards the God who had saved them from countless amounts of trials and self-indulging actions.

Not to disbar JER 29:11, but when considering The Bible, LSU vs. BAMA, my life or yours – context is everything. Israel continued to fall short after God brought them out of their Babylonian exile, LSU may never beat Alabama as long as Saban’s reign continues [Geaux Tigers, Forever LSU], and I still don’t have a wife or DPT behind my name, yet. This isn’t the ideal-super-encouraging-faith post, but it’s real life, and I know all of these things are the way they are for a reason. 

John Piper once said, “Life is hard. God is good.” 1 Peter 1:6-7 says, “In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith – more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire – may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”

It is easy to incur what I’ve heard coined as “spiritual amnesia,” when considering the current personal sufferings we may find ourselves in, and how one can so easily forget of God’s goodness as soon as something not-so-great happens. This abstraction of faith solidifies in action, and when I let my fears take the reins of my thoughts, my actions surely follow suit.     

A strong woman once told me that as an athlete, some are scared to give 100% because they may find out they are not good enough. Some allow that fear to cripple their walk, while some face it head on. If I’m being honest with myself, I’ve done both. But I take heart in the fact that trials test faith (in whatever that may be for you), and that through these trials we gain multi-faceted endurance to continue our race.