Last week, many people were amazed at the comeback by
43-year-old Tiger Woods, in winning the Master's at Georgia's Augusta
National. Over the past decade, Tiger had gone through four back
surgeries and the global disgrace of repeated marital infidelities. But
now he seemed to have recovered his former golfing glory!
I am not much of a golfer, but one of my favorite New York
Times columnists is a passionate golfer. That would be Thomas L.
Friedman, whose foreign affairs column I always enjoy. But this time he
surprised me and he talked about Tiger Woods and golf. Tom Friedman wrote
"golf is the sport most like life."
He noted that, "it is played on an uneven surface and
everything is on you. So, good and bad bounces ---- and
self-inflicted mistakes ---- are built into the game. And so much of
success in golf, as in life, is about how you react to those good and bad
bounces, Do you quit? Do you throw your club? Do you
cheat? Do you whine? Do you blame your caddie?"
But, is golf really so much like life? "In one
sense," says Friedman, "each and every round of golf is a journey,
and like all of life's journeys it's never a straight line. It's about
crazy bounces, self-inflicted mistakes and unexpected detours, and therefore
becomes a journey of discovery about yourself and your 'playing
partners'." "And, if you love the game, its an everlasting
journey in search of self-improvement."
To Tom Friedman, Tiger's plays under pressure were stunning,
but it was not just luck or even pure physical attributes. Friedman
believes it was about practice ---- hours and hours and
hours. Friedman quotes Gary Player as saying, "The more I practice,
the luckier I get." "And," says Tom Friedman, "that
is where the meaning of Tiger's comeback seems to begin ---- the willingness to
commit to endless hours of practice. How many of us have that iron
will?"
Most of us make a variety of commitments all the time.
Some are observed long-term, while others are forgotten in a few days. Many
of our commitments will be about something which we expect will benefit ourselves ----
"I must lose 15 lbs." Perhaps most of Tiger's commitments were
to benefit him.
But we do not really just live solitary, isolated lives, so
we also make commitments to benefit some of the people around us. Here's
the hard part ---- what sort of balance should I seek between commitments
for my benefit, and my commitments to other people, near and
far?
If Tom Friedman and I were actually having this
conversation, face to face, I would have had some questions. I would have
asked Tom, how did Tiger Woods avoid the conclusion that his success was all
about HIM? Is there some source where I can seek coaching on how to
protect my emotive heart, but also share my heart with others? How do I
keep my occasional golfing practices from making me believe that "I could
become the greatest golfer" ---- my latent old pride? Is obsessive
golfing practicing the best way for me to leave the world in better shape than
when I found it? Most importantly, is "practice, practice,
practice" in giving to others the right way for me to develop a long-term
commitment to giving care to others?
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These thoughts are brought to you by CPC's Adult
Spiritual Development Team, hoping to encourage you to pursue some personal
growth this Spring at CPC.
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