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.

grace forgets

 

Had a chance some time back to talk with someone named Rory I played basketball with when we were much younger; I had not seen him since then.

Basketball was never quite my sport (more of a baseball and tennis guy myself). I was OK but not great on the basketball court, and I harbored zero illusions that I’d ever progress beyond the basic lay-ups, free throws or jump shots (though I did show potential at drawing fouls).

What was a pleasant yet innocuous conversation took an unexpected turn when Rory began apologizing to me for the time many, many years ago when, out of frustration, he heaved a basketball at me during practice.

You know those mistakes you make, where if you ever get a chance to say sorry to a person you wronged, you plan to apologize (no matter how long after the fact it is)? I was hearing one of those apologies. He profusely expressed his remorse, and said that he now coaches young kids playing basketball, and that he always shares this very story with them when he discusses showing respect on the court, and being a team player.

Here’s the thing: I absolutely remember nothing of this ever happening.

I don’t doubt that Rory’s telling the truth. It’s not even one of those events I forgot, but then remember once it’s brought up. I just plain do not recall a bit of this.

So I’m grateful Rory apologized for something that so clearly anguished him for so long. But I also wish he could have known before apologizing just how much I didn't remember a bit of it.

In all our perpetual, crippling ways in which we critique ourselves, we could stand to reflect on this reminder: people are rarely as critical or as exacting on us as we are on ourselves. We quite naturally zoom in on our perceived flaws. We replay them over and over and over and over and over again. We claw our emotions in self-loathing over something we said that we thought was wrong or awkward. We can too often believe that everyone remembers and replays our self-perceived worst moments as vividly and as often as we do.

But they do not.

It is healthy to apologize for when we’ve wronged others. We could benefit from extending the same grace of healthy forgetfulness to ourselves. Doing this doesn’t feel as natural, but it is more like reality. It’s a relief to eventually truly realize that other people just aren’t watching us in a sort of nitpicky, hyper-critical, waiting-for-us-to-mess-up kind of way.

I remember Rory as a very good basketball player, a friend from scouting, and a decent guy, teammate and classmate. A moment that was a tsunami of regret from his vantage point … was absolutely nothing from my vantage point. It’s a helpful story he shares with his players. I do hope he also shares that he got to apologize to me, and that I remember absolutely nothing of it.

There’s much grace in learning to see ourselves as graciously, and as forgetfully, as others do.