As I watched the closing of the London 2012 Olympic Games this morning, I know I will miss the visual feast of lithe, muscled bodies performing nigh impossible feats of physicality.
There is something incredibly beautiful about the smooth, practised movements of an athlete at her/his peak, giving the performance of her/his life with maximum focus and heart.
The lessons I draw from this penultimate sporting event are varied. Firstly I am reminded that the body is made for movement and it would serve me well to keep mine in working order by maintaining good health and physical fitness through diet and exercise.
I also like that the Games transcend socio-economic, racial and cultural boundaries, levelling the playing field so that every participant is judged purely on skill, with a fair chance at winning. The politics of real life rarely allow for such unbiased judging. If only we can apply the rules of fair play to life more often.
Watching some of the athletes interviewed on YouTube brought home to me how much discipline and sacrifice are required. Their deceptively effortless movements lure me into forgetting how many hours of gruelling practice each athlete must undergo in order to arrive at this point in competition.
The road must've been strewn with failure, obstacles, injury, pain, frustration and even despair, and yet, no matter how arduous the journey has been, not one of them gave up. Thus every athlete present at the Games is already a winner, with an attitude to match.
As Randy Pausch proclaimed in The Last Lecture:
“The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.”
So the Olympics is largely about dreams, chasing our dreams and attaining our deepest desires. For each Olympian, the dream leading up to the Games was clear: be good enough to qualify as a participant in the Games. At the Games itself, the dream was to win a medal and/or to break a record. To surpass themselves, and others in competition.
For the rest of us, dreams and desires are a little less defined at times, but no less important. Saint Ignatius knew the significance of dreams and desires for he himself had great dreams that were shattered by injury and led him to finally dream the dreams that God had placed within him, desiring God's desire in his life.
This simple differentiation in Just Call Me Lopez by Margaret Silf is apt:
Disordered desires cannot bring true happiness for like a child that grasps selfishly at gratification, we are only momentarily satisfied, before we lust after something else, and yet another thing. The pursuit becomes an endless self-indulgent quest.
Whereas if we follow the ordered desires of our heart, we will actually be led to move out of ourselves toward self-actualization, which may not be about easy choices (just ask any Olympian) but will bring satisfaction, a sense of achievement and joy.
So it is worthwhile to examine our desires to uncover what Margaret Silf calls our root desires in Landmarks. To figure out what drives us to act and how we can actualize our gifts and talents and share them with the rest of the world.
Because our deepest desires have been planted within us by God, if we take time to spend time with Him in prayer, in contemplation, we will walk forward by God's wisdom, if not by human insight.
I'd like to share the beautiful ending of Silf's Just Call Me Lopez, which is at the heart of Ignatian spirituality:
"Trust your own story, for God is in every moment of it. Trust your own experience, for it is the raw material from which God is shaping God's Dream in you. Don't worry if you do not know who or what "God" is. Let the mystery be a mystery, and don't try to grasp it with your own understanding, or pin it down into the limits of your own memory, or manipulate it to conform to your own narrow will... God's love and grace are all you need."
There is something incredibly beautiful about the smooth, practised movements of an athlete at her/his peak, giving the performance of her/his life with maximum focus and heart.
The lessons I draw from this penultimate sporting event are varied. Firstly I am reminded that the body is made for movement and it would serve me well to keep mine in working order by maintaining good health and physical fitness through diet and exercise.
I also like that the Games transcend socio-economic, racial and cultural boundaries, levelling the playing field so that every participant is judged purely on skill, with a fair chance at winning. The politics of real life rarely allow for such unbiased judging. If only we can apply the rules of fair play to life more often.
Watching some of the athletes interviewed on YouTube brought home to me how much discipline and sacrifice are required. Their deceptively effortless movements lure me into forgetting how many hours of gruelling practice each athlete must undergo in order to arrive at this point in competition.
The road must've been strewn with failure, obstacles, injury, pain, frustration and even despair, and yet, no matter how arduous the journey has been, not one of them gave up. Thus every athlete present at the Games is already a winner, with an attitude to match.
As Randy Pausch proclaimed in The Last Lecture:
“The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.”
So the Olympics is largely about dreams, chasing our dreams and attaining our deepest desires. For each Olympian, the dream leading up to the Games was clear: be good enough to qualify as a participant in the Games. At the Games itself, the dream was to win a medal and/or to break a record. To surpass themselves, and others in competition.
For the rest of us, dreams and desires are a little less defined at times, but no less important. Saint Ignatius knew the significance of dreams and desires for he himself had great dreams that were shattered by injury and led him to finally dream the dreams that God had placed within him, desiring God's desire in his life.
The tricky thing is knowing the difference between
ordered and disordered desires. To be able to "distinguish between superficial wants and wishes and the desires that
express God's own desire for our lives."
Living as we do in an age where advertisers and media are clamouring to convince us what our desires are (often before we even know them), it is vital to clarify what are truly the desires of our heart.
This simple differentiation in Just Call Me Lopez by Margaret Silf is apt:
"Disordered desires tend to be all
about me and can make me greedy and possessive, taking what I think I want
without any care for the effects on others or on creation as a whole. Ordered
desires attract me toward what is life-giving, not just for me but for the
greater good, and if I follow them, I not only do no harm but actually add to
the greater good."
Disordered desires cannot bring true happiness for like a child that grasps selfishly at gratification, we are only momentarily satisfied, before we lust after something else, and yet another thing. The pursuit becomes an endless self-indulgent quest.
Whereas if we follow the ordered desires of our heart, we will actually be led to move out of ourselves toward self-actualization, which may not be about easy choices (just ask any Olympian) but will bring satisfaction, a sense of achievement and joy.
So it is worthwhile to examine our desires to uncover what Margaret Silf calls our root desires in Landmarks. To figure out what drives us to act and how we can actualize our gifts and talents and share them with the rest of the world.
Because our deepest desires have been planted within us by God, if we take time to spend time with Him in prayer, in contemplation, we will walk forward by God's wisdom, if not by human insight.
I'd like to share the beautiful ending of Silf's Just Call Me Lopez, which is at the heart of Ignatian spirituality:
"Trust your own story, for God is in every moment of it. Trust your own experience, for it is the raw material from which God is shaping God's Dream in you. Don't worry if you do not know who or what "God" is. Let the mystery be a mystery, and don't try to grasp it with your own understanding, or pin it down into the limits of your own memory, or manipulate it to conform to your own narrow will... God's love and grace are all you need."
No comments:
Post a Comment