Shifting Gears & A Bit of Business

It's been almost a year since my last post. Things have gotten busy, but partially because I've let them build up to that.

I'm going to do something which I've wanted to do for some time, and that's change the account that I blog from to something more personal; "tga2arh" is a great concept, and the new blog will be titled the same, but like I said, I want something that's more me.

The previous posts associated with this account will remain available, but all new posts will be completed with a new account.

You can find that new account here.

Laying Down Our Crowns

And every [athlete] that strives for the mastery is [disciplined] in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we [do it to obtain] an incorruptible [crown]. (1 Corinthians 9:25)

Blessed is the man that endures temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life... (James 1:12)

“...be faithful unto death, and I will give you a crown of life.” (Revelation 2:10)

The twenty-four elders fell down before him that sat on the throne, and worship him that lives forever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, “You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honor, and power…” (Revelation 4:10-11)

These verses all speak about the crown that we can receive from God. Now, as the 24 elders – who have the extremely exalted position of having seats stationed around God’s throne room – show us, by example, that they “cast their crowns before the throne” of God and tell him that he is “worthy… to receive glory and honor.” I seriously doubt that their exalted position, the casting of their crowns, and their statement immediately afterward about God being worthy, are unrelated in the least.

In fact, I had an experience that illustrated this for me quite accurately.

A few years ago, I began teaching in special education. As part of the temporary license I received, I had to complete my coursework. In the classes I completed during that time, I was fairly successful; I think I had a 3.9 GPA and passed my exit exam without any problems.

But I’m not here to brag about my grades – quite the opposite, actually.

You see, I received an invitation to join an honor society because my GPA was so high (top 15% of grad students, I believe was the criteria).

But I didn’t keep the notification letter.

On the contrary, I framed it and gave it to my dad for Christmas that year.

What I also gave my dad that year was a framed list of some of the things I loved about him while I was growing up. One of the first items on the list was that he inspired good study habits by “bribing me” for good grades. On this item, I also noted that his rewarding me for receiving good grades “has left a lasting impression” on my desire to achieve academically.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful for what I’ve been able to accomplish in all the classes I’ve taken in my life. But when I gave my dad that framed honor society letter as a gift, in effect, what I was saying was that you had so much to do with this that I can’t possibly take credit for it.

This is what it means to, as the song “We Fall Down” puts it,

We fall down

We lay our crowns

at the feet of Jesus

We are basically saying that,

Jesus, you had so much to do with what we’ve accomplished that we have to give you the credit. We can’t take credit for it ourselves because we don’t have anything – our skills, knowledge, resources, etc. – that you haven’t already given to us.

NCAA Basketball vs. the Peaceful Warrior, Part 3: The Craving

Later in the movie, after some training with Socrates, Dan’s coach tells him “no” to the possibility of going back and making the final qualifier for the Olympics.

Socrates shares some of his wisdom about the fact that Dan isn’t able to compete – and thus to achieve that gold medal he’s been working toward all of his life:

“Nearly all of humanity shares in your predicament, Dan: if you don’t get what you want, you suffer. And even when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer, because you can’t hold on to it forever.”

His point is that what Dan loves is gymnastics; he’s practiced it all his life. He doesn’t need anyone’s permission to go out and perform the stunts and moves he’s learned over his lifetime:

“The gold (medal) is a craving: ‘if only I’d have it, I’d be happy.’ Can’t you hear yourself?”

They then go on a hiking trip, to a place Socrates has wanted to show him since the first night Dan showed up at the gas station.

At the end of the hike, Socrates points out the rock next to Dan’s foot, who is disappointed at it, but Soc reminds him, “The whole trip up here, you were excited, you were happy.”

“Yeah, because I thought I was gonna see something.”

“You were like a kid on Christmas morning, you said so yourself. The whole trip up here, you were excited, you were happy!”

“Because for the past 3 hours, I’ve been waiting to see this wonderful thing.”

“What changed?”

“That there’s nothing here but this rock!”

(He forgets the fact that it’s a sunny day, the sky is a beautiful shade of blue, and there is plenty of fresh air.)

“I probably should’ve told you that before we left, but I guess I wasn’t sure what we’d find, either. Never am."

As he starts to walk away, he calls over his shoulder, "Sorry you’re not happy anymore.”

It's then that Dan realizes the lesson to be learned: “The journey. The journey’s what brings us happiness, not the destination.”

At the end of the movie, during the Olympic qualifiers, Dan is talking with Tommy, one of his teammates, about the “magic” that he’s learned the last few months while rehabbing from his motorcycle accident:

“It’s not magic, Tommy, just getting rid of all that bullshit you have up in your head that tells you ‘you might not be enough.’ So you get up there, you make every move about the move, alright? Not about the gold, not about what your dad thinks of you, not about anything but that one moment in time.”

Tommy responds, “But this is for the gold. Everything we do, Dan, I mean, at least for me, my whole life is about getting those 20 seconds in front of those judges so they can give me that gold... You want to know how my whole life would change, how everything that’s a problem right now wouldn’t matter anymore? I get everything I want. I get to be happy.”

Truly?

No, for God has not made life in such a way that we have no choice but to wait until we achieve or acquire [fill in the blank with whatever accomplishment or material possession], and then we can be happy, for “there is nothing better for a man than that he should eat, and drink, and make his soul enjoy good in his labor; this also, I saw, that it was from the hand of God” (Ecclesiastes 2:24).

True happiness is not dependent on being in the spotlight, making the big bucks, or doing some grand and great work or deed, but by “taking out the trash” of our mind and simply enjoying every aspect of what we have right now: this moment.

NCAA Basketball vs. the Peaceful Warrior, Part 2: Taking Out the Trash

If you didn't catch Part 1, go here.


Dan goes on to compete in tryouts for the pommel horse since a teammate has been injured. He does amazingly well, using the “take out the trash” technique and simply focusing on what he was doing:


“I wasn’t worried about what might happen, what could happen, what did happen, I just got up there, and I cleared my mind, and I was flawless,” is his report about practicing the “emptying the trash” for the first time. He was totally focused in the present and what was happening at that moment, with no thought about how it would/could affect the future. He simply enjoyed and focused on what he was experiencing right then.

Later in the movie, Dan has a breakdown in regard to how his training’s going, and his final words in the argument are, “When I get what I want, then I’ll be happy.” He’s referring to the Olympic gold medal he’s been training for his whole life. And then he walks out the door.

(What strikes me at this point is, If you love doing something, why does it have to be a competition? Why not just do it and enjoy it? Why does everything have to be performance-based? I mean, Dan remarks about his love for gymnastics that he’s been on a trampoline since he was a boy because he loved it.)

Dan ends up getting in a motorcycle accident, shatters his leg, and the news from his doctor is that, “with some hard work, you’ll eventually be able to walk again.”

This seems to throw all his dreams of that Olympic medal out the window.

Sitting on the lawn at school, Joy, a friend of Socrates’ and someone who Dan has met before at the gas station, stops by to talk to him. During the conversation, she makes the comment, “I know this is a scary moment for you. Are you paying attention to it?”

In other words, “Are you focused on this moment? Where is your mind? Are you taking out the trash and being present?”

Once Dan goes back to visit Socrates (it’s been several weeks), one of his tasks is to come up with an insight worth sharing. After some interesting attempts, his eventual realization is that, “There’s never nothing going on. There are no ordinary moments.”

In other words, every moment is extraordinary; all you have to do is focus on it and pay attention to it.

Thus, there is no such thing as “One Shining Moment,” for every moment is “shining,” regardless of how much “spotlight” may be pointing at it. All you have to do is “take out the trash.”

In the final scene of the movie, these thoughts are narrated right before Dan finishes completing his Olympic qualifier routine:

Socrates: “Where are you, Dan?”
Dan: “Here.”
Socrates: “What time is it?”
Dan: “Now.”
Socrates: “What are you?”
Dan: “This moment.”

He goes on to complete an amazing  series of flips, and you almost get the impression that he does it, not for the gold, but for the simple enjoyment of performing the movements...

NCAA Basketball vs. the Peaceful Warrior, Part 1: “One Shining Moment” vs. “No Ordinary Moments”

(So this time last year, I was part of a group that provided some content for the Richmond.com Spirituality section of the website. This was one of the articles that I submitted that didn’t get published. I’ll post all 3 parts this week. I’d be interested to know what people think...)


For anyone (like myself) who may not have known, One Shining Moment is the theme song for the NCAA Basketball Tournament. The lyrics of the song glorify the 15 minutes of fame that the best-of-the-best in college basketball get to enjoy:

But time is short
and the road is long
in the blinking of an eye
ah that moment's gone.
And when it's done,
win or lose,
you always did your best
cuz inside you knew...
 
(that) one shining moment,
you reached deep inside,
one shining moment,
you knew you were alive.

This is how the world approaches things: you only have the chance to be alive when you’re doing something truly “great” (whatever “great” means); everything else is just ordinary:

You better lose yourself in the music,
the moment,
You own it,
you better never let it go!
You only get one shot,
do not miss your chance to blow
This opportunity comes once in a lifetime
(“Lose Yourself” by Eminem)

This way of thinking will self-perpetuate until we refuse to buy into it.

Enter in the Peaceful Warrior.

For those who don’t know, Peaceful Warrior is a movie about Dan, a gymnast, who begins his warrior apprenticeship under Socrates, his nickname for a night-shift gas station attendant. What Socrates practices is a radical way of approaching how you live each moment of your life. Early in the movie he makes the comment, “That’s the difference between us, Dan: you practice gymnastics. I practice everything.” The implication of this is that we go through life without thinking (or truly paying attention) about (or to) what we do.

The first lesson Dan learns is to “take out the trash” of his mind, emptying useless thoughts, and to accomplish this, Socrates throws him over the side of a bridge into the water.

“And while you were falling, tell me, Dan, what were you thinking about? (You were) Present. Devoted, 100% to the experience you were having,” not thinking about anything else except what was happening right now in that moment.

Immediately after this, to Socrates’ comment that Dan’s mind is “filling up again, missing out on everything that’s going on,” Dan says, “There’s nothing going on.”

Socrates places his hands on Dan’s shoulders, forcing some sort of awareness-energy into his body, making him acutely aware of everything that’s going on: friends laughing together, a dog catching a Frisbee in the park, the sound of textured pages being turned by someone reading a book, and even a ladybug crawling up a blade of grass... all of which are intensified in their sensation by allowing simply being aware of it.

After releasing him, Socrates finally responds to Dan’s comment by saying, “There’s never nothing going on. Take out the trash, Dan. The trash is anything that’s keeping you from the only thing that matters: this moment. Here. Now.” Then he whispers, “And when you truly are in the here and now, you’ll be amazed at what you can do, and how well you can do it...”