ADVERSITY

During these last 3-weeks, things have been extremely busy.  We have a new a new group of superintendents in charge of our school district.  The administrative principals are new at our high school.  We started our pre – season football camp with a new head coach and new faces on our coaching staff.  There was so much going on, I could not find time nor isolate anything to post about.

I can say, in 20 years of coaching, last night’s win was one of the proudest moments of my career.  There was plenty of off the field professional adversity that trickled down to our kids.

We started our season last night.   Our opponent was ranked, in some publications, as #1 in Texas and as high as #6 in the nation.  I’ve never understood how “high school” football teams could be ranked nationally.  Supposedly, from 10th through 12 grades, they have 15 high school kids with FBS College Football Scholarship Offers.  Their “back – up” quarterback has a scholarship offer and is committed to The University of Florida.  Manvel had soundly beat us 35 – 10 in 2014.

Granted, we are talented in our own right.  We have 3 to 5 FBS College Football Scholarship type players.  We are also ranked #11 in Texas and #20 nationally.

We trailed at half time 12 – 7.  Early in the 3rd quarter we trailed 20-7.  The officiating was among the worst I’ve ever seen in 20 years.  Some rules are set up for the physical protection of the athletes.  Yet, we were fortunate not to lose players to injury because these rules were not called.  Our players did a great job of keeping their composure against “smack talking” and punching or shoving after plays.

We scored 22 unanswered points and were able to win the game.  In the process, we had a wide receiver make a physically tough guy catch across the middle.  He had to be helped off the field but would return.  A sophomore linebacker intercepted a pass and returned it 57 yards for a touchdown.  Our place kicker is a kid that has worked his way into maximizing his abilities.  He made a 31 yard field goal to seal the win 29 – 26.

Our team overcame adversity to win one football game.  One task at a time, right down to one play of that one game, they mentally and emotionally applied themselves.  Basic psychology and human nature shows that the more time and effort a person invests in something, the more important it is to them.  Sports becomes a passion for those who invest their time and effort into it.

Adversity is defined as an unfavorable fortune, event or circumstance.  A Tragedy is a fatal, lamentable or disastrous event.

Some athletes work for a life time for short moments of competition.  Parents love their children because they are their children, not accomplishments.  This is one of my favorite Youtube motivational videos.  It is about Derek Redmond in the 1992 Olympics.

Athletics represent life.  In athletics and in life, plans are put in place, God’s plans.  All we can do is put forth our best effort to glorify his blessings.  We must adjust, improvise, adapt and overcome adversity.

Shelby, 13, and Cameron, 10, were baptized on Sunday 9 June, 2013.  Dana fought to attend the baptism.  Yet, the portable oxygen tank would not provide enough oxygen for her to breathe.  In order for me to get to the girl’s baptism, I left Dana with her mother in our driveway with a 100 foot oxygen tube running from the home sized oxygen unit inside our house to her in the car.  This is the video Dana never saw.

My next post will be about the ‘Power of a Positive Attitude’ and ‘The Process’.

 

MORE THAN JUST A GAME

There is a DVD about Kenny Chesney’s song The Boys of Fall.  It is called The Boys of Fall: When You’re Playing, You Think You’re Going to Play Forever.    It is a film by Kenny Chesney and  Shaun Silva.  This clip is about 2-Minutes long with comments from:

Joe Namath:  Super Bowl champion and Hall of Fame Quarterback

Bill Curry: Won champions as a player and coach.  Earned 5 different ‘Coach of Year’ awards through 3 decades of coaching.  He has had one term as the President of the NFLPA.

Condredge Holloway:  Quarterback at the University of Tennessee 1972 – 1974

Bill Parcells:  Super Bowl Champion and NFL Hall of Fame Coach

I value education.  I have a Master’s Degree, earned with a 3.9 graduate school grade point average.  Roughly 30% of Americans actually earn a four year college degree.  Only about 10% have an advanced degree.  Playing the odds, I believe there is a direct correlation in the level of education a person earns and their average income.  As a political system, our democracy / republic only functions as well as it’s people are educated.  However, I have learned far more about life from athletics than I did from the world of academia.

Life is made up of human beings, our environment, animals and the symbiotic circle between us.  It is about relationships.  Relationships are interpersonal interactions between us.  Within these interactions are defined roles.  Leaders, followers, partners and support providers all working in greater harmony with defined and accepted roles.  Some of the most significant accomplishments in all of the human race are marriages, creating and responsibly raising a child, leading someone to Christ or simply serving as a positive influence on another.  For those of us that are Christian believers, our faith is founded on our personal relationship with God.  Even the United States Military works together in teams.

Teams involve a surrender of an individual’s ego or personal agenda for a role in the unified effort of a group toward a common objective.  Life is about team.  Sports, in my case, specifically football,  teaches us about life.  Sports teaches us the value of: team and teamwork, the significance of a positive attitude and mental toughness {resiliency}, the value of a solid work ethic / effort, the power of commitment, and discipline.

High School Sports programs are the best Response To Intervention {RTI} solutions for at-risk youth.  High School age students that participate in sports have better attendance and higher grade point averages.

The power of athletics transcends the world of academics and life situations.  One of the last fun and positive memories I share with my wife, Dana, before her health deteriorated due to breast cancer, was us watching the LSU vs. Alabama “Game of the Century” in November 2011.  LSU won the game 9 – 6.  Moreover, as her health began to deteriorate, I remember walking in our house and seeing Dana and her sister sitting on the couch together with an LSU Baseball game on TV with an LSU Softball Game on a laptop computer.  Sports, specifically LSU athletics served to provide us a few moments of levity when it was needed most.

As coaches and players, the lessons and relationships of athletics last a lifetime.  In June 2015, I visited a recently graduated former player that had been shot.  He laid in his hospital bed and told me about his thoughts while in transit to the hospital immediately following the shooting.  Thoughts of, “Man, coach, all  I kept thinking about was things you used to tell us.”

In the most extreme of life’s adversity and the most joyous of triumphs, athletics are more than just a game.

Hello

The following quote is from Matt Millen.  I saw it on NFL Network’s, ‘A Football Life: Matt Millen’.

All we are is a collection of where we’ve been 

I count it a blessing for all of the experiences I’ve had

The good and bad, ya tend to learn the most from the bad

I wouldn’t change any of it

If you can add to those lessons, a little faith, a little hope

A little grace, you’ll have a better chance.

Matt Millen’s quote resonates with me for many reasons.  Growing up an “Army Brat”, I’ve literally lived on the east and west coasts, places in between and overseas.  Throughout my father’s career, our family’s average stay in one place was 18 months.

Adversity is part of life here on earth.  True tragedy can harden a person’s heart.  Hard times can people bitter, if they allow.  Bad things happen to good people.  I can not explain things like: my wife and mother of 2 young daughters would die of cancer, being involved in a fatal car accident, murder, suicide, or even divorce.   The Bible teaches that we are meant to be more than conquerors.  As more than a conqueror, we must do our best to face this adversity head on.  It is too passive and dismissive to simply state, “everything happens for a reason.”   Since we are going to experience adversity and tragedy along with all of the pain and sorrow that they bring, we deserve to experience love, joy and happiness in corresponding proportions.

For me, my Christian faith has been part of what has helped me move forward through the adversity of life.  For those of us that are Christian believers,  it is not enough to simply recognize God as the ultimate authority.  Action in our lives define that recognition.   Behavior is our attitude in action.  Since God is the ultimate authority in our lives, part of a maturing attitude and behavior involves surrendering our own individual plans in attempts to identify God’s perfect plan for us.   Part of that surrender is devoting daily time with God in scripture and prayer.  This develops a relationship.  Within that relationship, we consult with God about our daily decisions.   Within that relationship, we can begin to attempt to learn positive lessons from the adversity  and tragedy in our lives.  That is part of learning to be better and not bitter.

Since we can not change the past and God’s plan is perfect, “better not bitter” is part of the acceptance of the adversity and tragedy of the past.   Part of the acceptance is finding positives in all experiences, “silver linings.”  This search for the positives can help keep a person positive and serve to build others up.  It is a great feeling to find the positives in others and always be trying to help make a positive impact in people around you.

Daily life involves blessings of all kinds.  To quote NFL Hall of Fame Coach, John Madden, “When God made us, he put a little “not done yet” in all of us.”  I am not done yet, just a work in progress trying to grow and get better.