Monday, June 15, 2009

SPORTS ... AS LIFE!

PROLOGUE:

Ooh, how I hate to be Jameer Nelson! If he had closed out on Derek Fisher's 3 pointer at the end of regulation of game 4, he wouldn't have the haunting feelings he will have the rest of his life. The only way he will be able to live with that, is by not only winning a championship, but winning with the core group of guys that he cost a chance at a title.


Not a guarantee that they'd have won a title, but they would have won the chance to compete for one. That was a playground move, giving up the long open shot, and hope he miss. That Derek Fisher was having a bad shooting night didn't matter as much as the situation did. You don't let the guy shoot the 3 point shot when it can tie or win the game without contesting it.

But he didn't. And it is harder to live with the things you didn't do than what it is you have done.

Along with Kobe Bryant, I am an unabashed Sidney Crosby hater. He is what he is, one of the top skaters in the NHL. I don't like him, because he grates on my nerves. His 'shunning' of handshakes at the end of game 7 bothered me. Had it been anyone else, I would have shrugged it off, chalked it up to youth and excitement. But 'Sid the Kid' has spouted off on stuff that makes me think that he is another in a line of athletes that think it is just about 'them'.

"NUMBER ONE, I APOLOGIZE ..."

I watch the press conference where Mike Singletary explains what happened with Vernon Davis after the game with the Seattle Seahawks (I think I said it was the Saints the last time I referenced it) sorta kind of regularly. The passion he showed ... in his words and his carriage was obvious. I keep watching it because it is a good framework for my life.

Somewhere, I read or heard what I call an typical story of relationship fail. It went something to the effect that the woman collects Winnie-the-Pooh stuff, and for a birthday, her fiancee bought an expensive Mickey Mouse thingy. Now, she said she called the whole thing off in short order, but in 'real life', that is the exception and not the norm.

People often put up with stuff that is meant to be a deal breaker, because the wire it trips, is connected to something that is very important to a person. I think it was like that for me ... I could talk about stuff with my ex wife, but all I really have to do is come back to being her boyfriend and having her spout off about 'Tommy Hearns this, and Tommy Hearns that' (and I hadn't yet discovered myself that 'this and that' weren't related ...) IN FRONT OF MY FAMILY. I won't even go into THAT, as it should speak for itself.

Mike wants you to understand that "It will change," because of what THEY wanted, not because he said so. He did gloss over the ambiguity that uncertainties brings when you figure out 'the formula' for what it is going to take to make something happen.

When I think of my 'ex list' idea, I liked it because there were certain questions that could be asked by both me and that person, and find out if we had a real good chance at a relationship. Because see, "it's not so much the play, it's the mindset". Where ever some one's mind is at, will determine more than anything else. Jameer Nelson's competitive instincts were dulled, because he had been hurt and hadn't been playing. There would be no guarantee if he had ran out, but with the mindset behind him of 'make him miss, win the game', it could have affected the fate of the shot.

One of the reasons I have found myself in relationships with people from 'hither and yon', is because I don't worry about how they go about achieving their happiness in life, in love as they do, but the mindset, the WHY. Having a basic formula is very important to not just me, but to EVERYTHING in life. So how could it not be critical to an individual that they have a fundamental and honest understanding of who they are, why they are going about things and how they are going to make things happen.

When you look at people who 'have the things you want for yourself', it is often through the prism of the 'sparkle' of what it is that you admire, not the effort of what made it happen. It is hard to fathom the committment that someone has made to get to what they earned.

The idea of 'hitting them in the mouth' is also part of a mindset, where for me came from dealing with the strange mix of traits that were in me, and picking out the ones that I liked best, and 'maintain' them. I felt that someone who knew me, would be qualified to help me find and 'polish' the good that is still in me.

If it seems that I dance around things, I am sorry for that. Because I am journaling, you get to 'see' the work and the processes play out. In person, I think that I am able to make decisions with the appropriate decisiveness.

MAKING DECISIONS THAT COST THE TEAM

Folks that do that, are only in the thing for what being involved in 'it' can do for them, make choices that favor them AT ALL TIMES. Even in their moments of selflessness, they are doing it so that later they can come back and make a grab at something for themselves.

That is what having a formula, a mindset should filter out of your life for you. For instance, subsituting for 'Tommy' is Gay/Lesbian rights. I watch and will listen to how that response is framed. I am not necessarily looking for anything, but I do know what I don't want to hear. Because if I hear that 'stuff', then I know that there is going to be other issues that we run into that are going to be just as impossible to over come, leading to relationship fail (the 'fail' thing just popped up today, and I am going to be 'fail'-ing a lot o' stuff from now on!).

Knowing what kind of thinking will inevitably lead to choices that 'cost the team' means a lot. If they are going to make those kind of choices in a relationship, and you are fine with it, then you will get what you pay for. Oh, and there is no pity for the majority (KMFDM, better than the best!) of people who do allow for that to enter their relationship lives.

" THAT MEANS WE EXECUTE...

...from the beginning of the game to the end of the game." That DID happen for me with Mookie, and it was so that I could fully appreciate what it is going to take to not only get to the end of the game, but to win. And that is what I want, winners.

Someone who has withstood the vagaries of their own lives and remained unbroken, spirit and essence still strong. I am hoping to find someone who still seeks to make the most out of the living that they have, and to expect that rain is the signal that there is going to be a beautiful rainbow to come.

'Begin with the end in mind', some wise cat said. And I do. Just the one small detail of remaining on the path that I had a problem with.

But I have stayed on this one. And since I am not at the end of it, I have no reason to look for another. Should the path diverge and become two ...

2 comments:

betty said...

I like your analogy with life and sporting events, Mark. I think a lot of thought went into this as you were thinking about it and writing it down.

got to say, though YEA LAKERS!!! I know Kobe Bryant is not a great role model, but boy can he play basketball some times

I would imagine Orlando will analyze and wonder what could have been different and incorporate that into next year and who knows how far they will go? I remember the humiliating loss of last year's finals with the Lakers and look what they did with it this year.

betty

Beth said...

Ugh...Lakers. No further comment.