Friday, June 5, 2015

Playing On The Field Of Life

By Evan Sanders


No matter what, there will always be this hum you'll hear from the stands. Though no matter the hum going on, we must focus on the field of life.

Take sports for example. In this case, baseball in particular.

There's this moment when you are up on the mound pitching where the sounds the other team is making, the fans in the stands and everything else in the stadium around you silences. It is just you and the catchers mitt. Everything slows down and the space between you and the plate really appears to shrink. You get this type of tunnel vision and when you realize you are in that moment, you are close to unhittable. Your body is in complete flow with your pitching mechanics and your motion becomes quite natural.

But there are so many moments when you walk 2 of guys, someone gets a squib hit, someone behind you makes a gaffe, and the game starts to rapidly speed up on you. When that occurs, boy are you able to hear all the loud distractions around you. You can hear the other team yelling, you can hear once quiet people in the stands and throwing a strike becomes extremely difficult.

How will we silence the inside and outside criticism in life?

How can we move past the fear of failing - the fear of success and not being able to handle it - the dread of being misinterpreted for something we aren't? How do we be less frightened of losing everything we have produced? The hard part is, the greater the risk you take the bigger the questions become surrounding it. What can we do to progress?

We have to notice that this is a component of the game.

Balls, strikes, home runs, blunders, over throws, passed balls, wild pitches, strikeouts, walks, that's all part of the game. It's not about having a perfect game each day. You can't do that. Pitching is about grooving when you have it and facing difficulty when you do not. There are so many times you go out there and 2 of your pitches are not working well in any way. What the hell do you do when that occurs?! Focus on the fact that you presently don't have your changeup and curve, start battering the strike zone with your best fastball - one that is backed by heart and has each last ounce of conviction behind it. No matter what, you try to keep throwing the other pitches because you wish to find them during the game, but you can not bring yourself into a negative space or else you will probably not going to make it out of the first inning.

The hum of the crowd is always going to be there and it can even get vicious at certain times. But it is better to be playing the game than sitting on the bench. It's better to actually be in a place facing feedback than to not be playing in any way.

And here's the closer. If you can get to a spot where you not only can tune out the negative things that people say, but also use that as fuel...you will launch yourself further than you ever could have imagined. Use something negative and create a positive result with it. Maybe that is the finest type of alchemy itself?

So get back to that place that you can focus hard on your objective and your purpose. There will always be opinions about what you are actually doing, but in the end, you really do have to litsen to what's inside.

Case closed.




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