sweat, and more sweat

 

The phrase ‘never let them see you sweat’ spread through our collective lexicon via an 80's antiperspirant deodorant commercial, of all places. The product sold well.

But I can at times act as though that axiom should apply everywhere -- whatever I set myself to do, it  needs to look like I've done it a million times, I'm prepared for every possible scenario, and it'll look smooth as silk to anyone who could be watching. No mistakes. No doodling, and starting over. Like an intro for a movie, I just want to skip over the long, tedious hours and practice it takes to improve at something.

Do you approach your self-critique this way? No room for off-days, no wiggle space for the inevitable face plant? That's a rough way to live. It doesn't work. 

Or maybe that's not how you self-critique, but others in your life -- perhaps well-meaning voices -- do come off this way to you. If only these folks could hear knew how counterproductive this was.

I had a professor in graduate school tell me that sometimes, we do get to cross a finish line on our to-do list with much fanfare, barely looking like we exerted effort along the way. Confetti and hype galore. 

But much more often, the prof said we limp and shuffle ourselves along, adorned with cuts and scrapes from tripping and tumbling upon the asphalt of life. That's the reality. That's the norm.

My pastor has sometimes talked about Jesus' story of the house built on the rock in relation to when a hurricane plows through a city. In the aftermath, the news stories inevitably will show the damage done. There's always a few houses still standing along those streets, but they never, EVER look pristine. It looks like they've endured a hurricane. Windows boarded up. A mess all over the yard. Trees fallen in the driveway.

No one would expect those surviving houses to look real-estate photo ready. They look weathered and worn, and it's totally normal.

Sometimes we endure struggles and times of serious testing. It's reasonable and expected that, if that's a time of life we happen to be mucking through, we would look like it.

'Never let them see you sweat?' 

It's a good ad line, but an unrealistic way to try to live.