SIDELINES!!!

“You don’t make progress by standing on the SIDELINES, whimpering and complaining. You make progress by implementing ideas.”        Shirley Chisholm

These past few weekends, I’ve watched the most entertaining and exciting football games ever!!  Even though my team was out of the playoffs weeks ago, I’ve enjoyed watching the other teams as they battled to play in the NFL’s biggest game -the Superbowl.  As I watched today’s game, I realized that football and life have a host of commonalities.  In both, we’ll experience some hard-hitting blows and if we want to win, we’ve got to get off the SIDELINES and play in the game.  That’s right….if we are expecting to win in the game of life, we have to be willing to play in it!!  Are you participating in the game of life?  Or are you content sitting on the SIDELINES?  Do you want to get off the SIDELINES and into the game?  I know I DO!!  So for this week’s blog, let’s talk SHIP about getting off the SIDELINES!!!

Being on the SIDELINES means that we are watching something happen but not taking an active part in it; or we are waiting to take an active part in something.  We’re watching our lives pass us by but are we actively participating in it? If not, how much longer are we willing to wait to make our dreams come true?  And, why are we waiting?  Each one of these football players has probably dreamt about winning the Superbowl from the day they first put on a uniform.  Yet, it is their actions that are making their dreams possible.  It’s time for us to STOP going through the motions of living and actually START living.  Living starts with dreaming and we all deserve to dream. But, we also deserve to make those dreams come true.   However, that requires that we get off the SIDELINES and do the hard work. 

Much like this weekend’s football games, life’s games are also filled with fumbles, interceptions, injuries, lost yardage, punts, touchdowns, and wins and losses.  No ifs, ands, or buts about it, in life we will inevitably experience some painful hits but we can’t allow them to SIDELINE us.  We can’t allow those hits to blow our confidence and make us doubt our abilities.  We can’t allow our fear of the next hit to keep us on the SIDELINES.  On the contrary, we should expect them –from life, from family, from strangers, and from friends.  Yet, it’s how we respond and handle those hits-the fumbles, the interceptions, the punts, the injuries, etc.-that matters most.  Do we allow the impact or the frequency of the hits, to SIDELINE us?  Of course NOT!! 

So what do we do?  After taking so many hits, eventually, we’ll learn.  We’ll learn that we were not born to follow but born to lead and when we realize that, we’ll lead ourselves off of the SIDELINES.  Once we are off the SIDELINES, we’ll begin to play the game confident in ourselves and our abilities.  We’ll allow our dreams to show us the path to our personal happiness.  After all, we are worth it! So what are we waiting for? Let’s put ourselves back in the game. Let’s dust off our uniform, catch our breath, remember our dreams, and get off the SIDELINES and start hitting back!!! 

SHIP TALK:  Are you sitting on the SIDELINES of your life?  

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