The Value of Relationships

The following is an excerpt from the book Flow by Mihaly Czikszentmihalyi.  It speaks very well to the value of those relationships and the importance of taking the time to make them positive and enjoyable.

“Unfair bosses and rude customers make us unhappy on the job.  At home an uncaring spouse, an ungrateful child, and interfering in-laws are the prime sources of the blues.  How is it possible to reconcile the fact that people cause both the best and the worst times?

“This apparent contradiction is actually not that difficult to resolve.  Like anything else that really matters, relationships make us extremely happy when they go well, and very depressed when they don’t work out.  People are the most flexible, the most changeable aspect of the environment we have to deal with.  The same person can make the morning wonderful and the evening miserable.  Because we depend so much on the affection and approval of others, we are extremely vulnerable to how we are treated by them.

“Therefore a person who learns to get along with others is going to make a tremendous change for the better in the quality of life as a whole.  This fact is well known to those who write and those who read books with titles such as How to Win Friends and Influence People.  Business executives yearn to communicate better so that they can be more effective managers, and debutantes read books on etiquette to be accepted and admired by the “in” crowd.  Much of this concern reflects an extrinsically motivated desire to manipulate others. But people are not important only because they can help make our goals come true; when they are treated as valuable in their own right, people are the most fulfilling source of happiness.”

"If we understand the art of marriage then we can understand God. Everything in life will either widen your scope or narrow it. Marriage is an act in which things are both widened to Infinity and narrowed to zero. There is no way out of it-that is what marriage is." Yogi Bhajan

Curtain Call

I literally controlled the ice that night. Jumping with uncanny ease, I seemed to jump to heights never reached before and with full turns of 3 rotations. I made the jumps that were destined for the late - night sports highlight reel. It was the Olympic figure skating championships and I was to bring home the gold for our team and our country, no one could take our team to victory but me. As I skated to the curtain I felt as though the world was watching. I would place my name in ice rink greatness. I felt as though I touched the “ Zone”… no that’s wrong…I owned the “ZONE”.

 It was short lived to be sure. My first blade stroke  past the curtain and the sound of my name being announced would label “ my victory” as merely a fluke, a slight brush with greatness. Desperately trying to recount the days routine, what did I eat?…how much sleep did I get the night before?…what was I wearing?…seemingly nothing would return me to that place and time, on a night I was capable of feats mere mortals could only watch and witness.

Since that day I can remember a handful of occasion where the feeling returned, be it ever so brief and rare. Not all were sports related. It appeared to be non selective occurring maybe at a business presentation, community function, or at a time of crisis. The feeling of complete comprehension, and total control of my destiny and surroundings…a focus or drive unmatched by those around me. It’s a resource that I can’t seem to tap at will. Is it always within me?…do I somehow trigger it’s surfacing by an event or an emotion? Is it mental, physical, or perhaps genetic?

 All I know is that I want it BACK!

 I know it exists…I must learn about it…study its nature…find out if I CAN APPLY IT TO EVERY DAY EXPERIENCES…my return to …  “THE ZONE"

Turning a Wound into a Gift

The Future of Sport

The Future of Sport

         I begin by taking my audience on a journey to the ancient world where athletic contests were offerings to the gods – and in some cases, notably the Mayas, it was the athletes themselves who were the offerings!  Sport was more than entertainment, an afternoon at the ball game, it was an individual and group religious experience.  Sport had divine purpose whether as a rite to win celestial favor, to placate an angry deity, or to honor departed heroes.

          Michael Novak, author of The Joy of Sports, insists this purpose still exists today:  “...sports flow outward from a deep natural impulse that is radically religious:  an impulse of freedom, respect for ritual limits, a zest for symbolic meaning, and a longing for perfection.”

          Furthermore, Novak and others argue this function of sport is eternal whether we acknowledge this or not.  Writes Andrew Cooper, “Sports satisfy our deep hunger to connect with a realm of mythic meaning...to see the transpersonal forces that work within and upon human nature enacted in dramatic form, and to experience the social cohesion that these forms make possible.  Whether or not we so name them, these are religious functions.”

          Sport’s spiritual function works on both the level of the athlete and the audience; in fact, each is often dependent on the other.  A winning performance by an athlete can stir a crowd into exhilaration, and they, in turn, can compel an athlete to new heights.  A few years ago B.C. Lions ad campaign “Cheering works” alludes to the popular notion of “home team advantage” whereby athletes are inspired by positive audience reaction and collective enthusiasm.  Perhaps it’s not an accident, then, that the word “enthusiasm” comes from the Greek, meaning “to be inspired or possessed by a god.”

          This religious aspect of sport, however, has once again been sublimated by a secular culture:  “Our society so thoroughly secularizes sport that we can barely recognize, let alone express, what it makes us feel,” laments Cooper.  Recognition of the sacred has been reduced to popular idioms such as “team worship,” “sports icon” and, yes, “The Zone.” Welcome 2010 OLYMPIC ATHLETES ...let the GAMES begin