Gotta get my fight on!

So, last night my husband gave me a butt kicking. It wasn’t a literal kicking but a verbal smack-down. He put his coach hat on and got in my face asking who ever goes to a game planning to lose? You see, being a Randall it is my primary nature to hear bad news and go immediately to the worst-case scenario in any situation. My dad was a safety supervisor at his department for the railroad so we grew up with ‘safety first’ talks day in and day out. I was never allowed to climb a tree – might break your arm. No skateboards – you’ll fall and crack you head open. If you mow the lawn (or even just go outside while someone is mowing the lawn, I am not kidding) – you must wear safety glasses because a rock will fly through the air and take out your eye. You see… safety first… no matter what.

Now, if you know my dad you are probably laughing at these illustrations and can see him hollering at us to be safe. You also know that these ‘safety rules’ come from his great love for us and desire to protect us from harm. (Love you too daddy.)

The problem with living in this kind of world is that you grow to also have an amazing ability to be in constant fear of the ‘what ifs’ in life. Over time, I have learned that fear, really isn’t a good motivator because fear isn’t based on love and usually results in defeat.

Anyways, back to the sports analogy my ESPN obsessed husband was trying to drive home. He was right… and got me thinking about needing to be psyched up for this ‘game’.

I remember when I was a Junior in High School, El Camino women’s soccer hosted  “The Eagle Cup”. It was held at Cherry Island and there were 2 days of games to make up the tournament. We were surely not the strongest team out there, but Coach Anderson did his best to get us ready to take on the world. I remember he would bring the tournament shirt the champions would win to practice and wave it around (like an ass) in the air as we did sprints, yelling at us that these shirts were ours to win. He would go on and on talking about how embarrassing it would be to not take home our own shirts or know that girls from some other team we wearing our shirts. He also had us do this chant:

“You got to want it, to win it, and we want it more.

You got to want it, to win it, and we want it more.

You got to want it, to win it, and we want it more.”

And if we didn’t scream it loud or act like we meant it…. We would end practice with running the stadium stairs, which is the soccer version of water torture. (As I write this, I suppose I see now how he taught us a great life lesson… but man I hated that guy. Anderson, if you somehow are reading this, thank you!)

Anyways, when the tournament arrived we did pretty good. In fact, we did awesome and made it to the final game against Davis High School. The final game actually went into overtime, but before we went to sudden death, I got to experience one of what is actually one of my proudest moments in soccer. I remember in that game getting side tackled and sliding into a mud pit… I was pretty angry.  Time was running out and Anderson told us to take whatever shot we could. Most of the overtime had been spent in our backfield-playing defense, so when as an offensive halfback I got the ball I knew we needed to do whatever it would take to score. I remember hearing those beastly Davis girls running up behind me and for whatever reason (probably fear of being tackled again) I took a wild outside shot on goal from about 30 yards out. The goalie was way out of her box and not expecting a shot on goal and the ball rolled right past the lower left post and into the net.

We one the game. We won The Eagle Cup. And most importantly we got to wear our own shirts home. I actually received MVP for the tournament, which was pretty awesome… although I still feel soccer is such a ‘team’ sport there is no point to having an MVP. Yeah… that was one of those awesome moments in time that you just don’t ever forget.

After my loving chewing out last night, I opened Face Book and found a message from a friend that I knew growing up in elementary school. She shared about her mother’s strength as she had fought cancer and the impact it made on her. She shared, “In my eyes, she went from "just Mom" to someone a whole lot bigger and stronger and unbeatable; not terms I had put together with my impression of her since I was small.”

Wow. I really needed to hear from a kids perspective just how vital it is for a mommy to be a fighter.  Her message came as perfect encouragement in the prefect moment.

So here’s where we are now....

I must shed my innate Randall disposition to live in fear. I need to decide to win and find my motivators. I have to figure out what I’ll be chanting through this ‘game’. I have 6 days to get my spirit in shape. Gotta get my fight on!