“The Dalai Lama..The Super Bowl…and Much ado about Something”

It’s been an interesting week in the news—or, at least, on my news feed. 

Birmingham and Atlanta, paralyzed by winter storms…The State of the Union Address…American Idol auditions…The Phoenix Open…Richard Sherman re-rants… Peyton Manning… a trip to Rome, GA, to see “the fam”…a new song or two…almost getting the caramel cake icing right.

I didn’t say it was MSNBC.  It was just some of the headline news on my screen.  What did your news feed look like?  What were the lead stories?  What stories bumped other stories or interrupted regularly scheduled programming?  In a week or so, which ones will you still remember?

Scripture would suggest that God—even with unlimited memory—just lets go of a lot of what happens over time. It’s just not worth saving. Unfortunately, so much of what we do and say and buy, and labor over, and worry about, and invest in—time-wise and money-wise—probably won’t make The Editor-in-Chief’s “Remotely Important” list.

A Shakespearean title comes to mind: “Much Ado About Nothing.”

Rescuing people trapped on gridlocked interstates; taking care of children who can’t leave school; hosting total strangers in churches and homes?  Something.

Spending tens of thousands of people-hours and, billions of dollars on food and tickets and travel and security and pre-game and halftime rehearsals—for yet another non-competitive Super Disappointment?  Nothing.

With all the amazingly important options out there—most of which cost little or nothing in monetary terms—we human beings keep going back to the same old “Nothing” bin and trying to make something out of nothing.

Late breaking news… “Actor/Oscar winner, Philip Seymore Hoffman, found in NYC apartment, dead of apparent drug overdose at age 47.”  Amazing talent.  Hyper-successful. Respected by his peers.  Loved by a beautiful life partner and mother of his three great kids.  And heroin.  It’s just a shame—all that “something” lost to a “nothing.”

The Dalai Lama wrote, “The planet does not need more successful people.  The planet desperately needs more peacemakers, healers, restorers, storytellers and lovers of all kinds.”

I would paraphrase that wisdom: “WE do not need to be more successful people.  We desperately need to be peacemakers, healers, restorers, storytellers and lovers of all kinds.”  

Yes, desperately.   The Nothing’s are killing us.

Keith

2/3/2014

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“The Naturals… you and me and Roy Hobbs”

If you had to list your ten all-time favorite movies, what might they be?  The elves of your subconscious are probably already running to the stacks and bringing titles up to the checkout counter of your mind.  Given time, you might come up with dozens, but there’s a good chance the first eight or ten were first for a reason. They bump into your story.

One film that jumps out for me is, “The Natural,” a baseball story starring Robert Redford and Glenn Close.  Close has one immortal line, addressing Roy in his maternity ward bed (long story).  “I believe we have two lives,” she says, “the one we learn from, and the one we live with after that.”

It’s another scene, though, that came to mind today, It’s a dugout scene where Roy (Redford) and Pops (Wilford Brimley) have a life-altering confrontation.

Roy was “The Natural”–a phenomenal young baseball talent destined to be “the best there ever was.”  Unfortunately, as is often the case, Roy’s dream got sidetracked by life.  He reappears as a late 30-something who still has the swing and the passion, but the clock’s ticking—loudly. The Knights, are a losing major league ball club managed by Pops. To say that he was frustrated with his players is an understatement. But he was further frustrated when one of his scouts sends him a middle-aged rookie—Roy Hobbs.  Pops refuses to play Roy or even let him practice.  Roy literally and figuratively rolls his eyes as he watches the team lose again and again. Tension between the rookie and the manager finally comes to a head.

“Hobbs,…I’m sending you down—to Triple-A ball,” Pops says. “I set the rules and you haven’t been playing by them.”

“I came here to play ball,” Roy shoots back, “…not to listen to some two-bit carnie (a joke of a sports psychologist).  I won’t do it, Pops…. I can’t.  It’s taken me too long to get here.”  Roy walks away—but Pops follows.

“Hobbs! Come here!… Batting practice…tomorrow… Be there!”

“I have been,” Roy says without a smile, “…every day.”

From then on, it’s a story of Roy knocking the cover off the ball and inspiring a team on to win the pennant.

As a fifty-something who knows he’s never touched his true potential—that unique something I know I coulda/woulda/shoulda done—”The Natural” stirs my hope-er. Maybe it stirs yours too.

Fellow Baby Boomers…now hear this: you aren’t dead and you aren’t done.

“Batting practice… tomorrow…be there.”

Keith

1/11/2014

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“Jiminy Cricket, Charlie Brown, and Changing Your Stars”

(A word: Friends, this blog is about four times as long as my usual posts. Very much the exception to the Shortbread rule.  But don’t think of it as a long blog… just think of it as a short book!  I could have chopped it up into several blogs, but I thought it would be most valuable to you as a unit.) 

All due respect, Jiminy Cricket, but wishing upon a star won’t—in the words of Larry the Cable Guy—“git ‘er done.”

If you have a piece of paper handy, draw a simple five-point star—a star representing your plan of action for 2014.  It is a star that you will look at each day of the year to assure that you are staying on task in order to get to where you say you want to be by January 1, 2015.

It’s an old question: “Can a person change his or her stars?”  In other words, can we, by changing our attitudes and actions, rewrite the way our life story will play out?… the way we will be remembered?

The answer: absolutely. 

What I offer today is a simple tool to help you change your stars.  It is an approach that can help you get a handle on that life goal or dream that has, eluded you to date.  I particularly have a heart for those who have struggled to find their highest and best. Like Charlie Brown, your kite keeps getting stuck in the tree, or Lucy keeps snatching the ball away just as you’re about to kick it.  I know those frustrations.  But the tool is not solely for those on the edges of the dance floor.  It is just as applicable for those in the middle and those near the top of the life-fulfillment ladder.  It’s for anyone who has something they sincerely want to accomplish over the coming months, in any give area of their life.

Now, let’s be clear from the get-go: if you won’t work, it won’t work.  If you are waiting on someone else to make your life happen, it won’t work. If you are a quitter, it won’t work.   This is a tool–not a magic wand.

And now, for the star.

The first point—the top point of the star—is INSPIRATION.  You’ve got to identify something you really want—or really want to be.  A clear target.  I believe that the best of our dreams and ideas come from somewhere beyond us.  Call it your destiny.  Call it the will of God for your life.  What are your primal dreams?  What do you want to be when you grow up?  What are those underlying desires, beneath the surface wants?

A meaningful vocation… a comfortable home… loving relationships…  an adequate retirement at a reasonable age.  I want to write a book… or a song….  I want to get my weight down to ___ lbs. in the name of being healthy and living longer.  I want a better relationship with my spouse.

What’s your INSPIRATION—i.e., your vision for you?  There will likely be several items–physical, spiritual, career, family, etc..  Which ones are on top of your list for this year?  Write them down! Cut out pictures from magazines that give you a visual of those dreams.  Put them on the refrigerator door or on the bathroom mirror to keep them before you and remind you that this is where you are going.  They are your INSPIRATION.

Move clockwise to the second point of this star. Tag it, EDUCATION.  You begin reading around the subject of your dreams. You take notes. You memorize quotes and devour training CD’s and videos. You immerse yourself in the topic.  You talk to people who know more about the subject than you do.  It is one thing to have a dream, it is quite another to do your homework so that you can score well when the test rolls around.  Jesus once said, “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” Vice-versa, where your heart is, there will your treasure be also.  If you really want something, you will invest yourself in it—your time, your money, your energy.

How do I go about writing a book?  How do I play a G chord on the guitar?  What tools do I need to build a piece of furniture?  How do I mix paints and work brushes to get the desired effect?  The second point of this star-changing star is EDUCATION.

The third point of the star is MOTIVATION. You’ve gotten a spark or two, but how do you fan that spark into flame, and how will you fuel the fire over time?  Great coaches are motivators.  They have the gift of drawing out the best in their players.  Where do we find the motivation to keep after our dreams?   You might Google “motivational speakers”.  Besides books or programs you might purchase, there is an ocean of free material.   You stay motivated by surrounding yourself with like-minded, can-do, wanna-do individuals. To stay motivated, you will probably need to say a few holy good-byes to individuals or groups that drag you down and pull you in the opposite direction of where you need to go.  Sadly, there are people out there who do not want you to succeed, and, consciously or unconsciously, they will try to undermine your progress.  MOTIVATION is the third indispensable point on your star.

The fourth point of the star is PERSPIRATION. Folks, if it was easy to be great, everyone would be great. But the truth is, anything worth having will involve sacrifice and strain…blood, sweat and tears.  It’s going to mean studying when you’d rather hang out with your friends or watch TV.  It’s going to mean making yourself go to the gym even when your don’t feel like it or even when it’s nine degrees outside (like it is this morning.)  PERSPIRATION—physical, mental, emotional, spiritual—means pushing yourself through to the next level, then pushing yourself to the next.   Sometimes, it means saying no to those old habits that keep you in that downward spiral of failure and shame.  Anyone knows—breaking old habits is hard work, but you can cultivate new habits and a new future with a little PERSPIRATION.

The fifth and final point on the star is DETERMINIATION.  It is easy to be good for a day…to be committed for a week.  But without unwavering resolve, dreams will evaporate over time and in the face of adversity.  If you haven’t made up your mind ahead of time that you are going to stay the course, you are likely to run from the battle.  “Where there’s a will,” as they say, “there is a way.”  What determination does is galvanize the will.  I know what I want—more, I know what I am meant to do and be—and I will get there…period!  Now, it’s just a matter of working out the practical steps from A to B, and following through.

The word, “determination” has two parts: “terminate” which means “to end”, and the prefix, “de”, which means “back” or “away from”.  To say that I am determined is to say there is no end to my resolve—that there is no going back.  DETERMINATION seals the star-changing deal.

In the middle of the star, I would just write the word, REALIZATION.  This is the pay-off for working the five points.  This is moving into the new home.  It is walking across the stage and receiving that diploma. It is stepping on the scales and seeing that you have reached your target weight.  It’s yelling along with Dave Ramsey, on live talk radio, “I’M DEBT FREE!!!!!”

There will come a point where you will find yourself enjoying this process. The late, great, Zig Ziglar’s wisdom comes to mind: “You don’t pay the price of success—you pay the price of failure.  You ENJOY the price of success.”

And you will.  I’d love to hear your star stories.

Keith

1/6/2014

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JFK…Maya Angelou…Gerry Hearin…and Great Trees

On this fiftieth anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, I am reminded of an amazing poem by Maya Angelou.  I heard it at the memorial service of Rev. Gerry Hearin, one of the greatest pastor-preachers I have been privileged to know.  You could not read this at just anyone’s memorial service.  It wouldn’t ring true.  But it was perfect for Gerry’s.  It’s a shame it came too late to be read at President Kennedy’s service

“When Great Trees Fall”

–by Maya Angelou

When great trees fall, rocks on distant hills shudder,

lions hunker down in tall grasses, and even elephants lumber after safety.

When great trees fall in forests, small things recoil into silence,

their senses eroded beyond fear.

When great souls die, the air around us becomes light, rare, sterile.

We breathe briefly.

Our eyes briefly see with a hurtful clarity.

Our memory suddenly sharpened, examines, gnaws on kind words unsaid,

promised walks never taken.

Great souls die and our reality, bound to them, takes leave of us.

Our souls, dependent upon their nurture, now shrink, wizened.

Our minds, formed and informed by their radiance, fall away.

We are not so much maddened as reduced to the unutterable ignorance

of dark, cold caves.

And when great souls die, after a period,

peace blooms, slowly and always irregularly.

Spaces fill with a kind of soothing electric vibration.

Our senses, restored, never to be the same, whisper to us,

They existed.  They existed.

We can be. Be and be better.

For they existed.

Here’s to JFK…and Gerry…and all the great trees of our lives.  And while we are at it, here’s to becoming the trees we were meant to be for others.  Thanks, Ms. Angelou for putting our feelings into words for us.

Keith

p.s., Go to any online or brick and mortar bookstore to find more of Maya Angelou’s word and wisdom.  I believe you will find, “When Great Trees Fall” in Mom and Me, and other collections of her poetry.

11/22/13

“Malala… Born on Third Base…and Degree of Difficulty”

“I am Malala!”

It is now the battle cry of millions of young women across the globe. A cry for freedom and justice. A call for the right to education and opportunity for girls in the face of the Taliban and oppressive forces everywhere.

When Malala Yousafzai was born in Pakistan, women commiserated with her mother.  Men gave no congratulatory words to her father.  Why?…because she was a girl.  But, her schoolteacher father says that, from the beginning, Malala was bright and inquisitive—particularly questioning why girls did not get to go to school like boys. In October of 2012, she was singled-out on a school bus full of young girls and shot in the head by a Taliban gunman. Why?  Because this “girl”, at the age of fifteen, had become a threat.  A voice for change and justice.

Now, just twelve months after her shooting–after what doctors agree was a miraculous recovery—Malala has spoken before the UN General Assembly, been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, gone viral on youtube…and her story, “I Am Mahala”, released just this week, is already on the bestseller lists.

As I saw Malala interviewed by Diane Sawyer, my mind skipped to a comment made by Ann Richards during a run for governor of Texas.  Of course, she had no specific opponent in mind when she said, “Some people are born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple.”

The struggle of fighting its way out of the cocoon is necessary for a butterfly to become a butterfly.  There are moral muscles, muscles of conviction and compassion, which are developed only through adversity.  The privileged are rarely privy to them.  We remember the Malala stories.  The rich—with rare exception—are forgotten, because their stories are forgettable, unremarkable. Their one hope of glory is to stand with the Malalas of the world. (e.g., Bill and Melinda Gates.)

In competitive diving, scoring is based on two factors: 1) a judges score of 1-10 for how well the dive is executed; and 2) the dive’s “degree of difficulty”. A simple forward dive has a degree of difficulty much less than, say, a back two-and-a-half somersault. Degrees range from 1.4 to 4.0.  So, even if both dives are perfect 10’s, the more difficult dive wins.

I’m giving Malala a perfect 10.0 after she started with a 4.0 degree of difficulty.  Way to go Malala! Your story comes in such stark contrast to what’s been going on in our nations capital.  Of course, 99% of those folks are at a disadvantage…

…they were born on third base.

–Keith   10-12-13

*  Want to read more about Malala?… http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/book-review-i-am-malala-by-malala-yousafzai/2013/10/11/530ba90a-329a-11e3-9c68-1cf643210300_story.html

website: http://keithelder.com/