Show Up as a Participant of Life

Show Up to Go Up

Ep. 10 Show Up as a Participant of Life

 

In the last episode Myranda and I talked about being a participant in your life and I want to talk more about that. I want you to think about your life as a sports match. For some reason my head goes to soccer even though my foot eye coordination is terrible and soccer has never been one of my strengths. But today this soccer game is a representation of my life and yours.

First I want you to see yourself in the stands cheering for a team to score a goal. Do you know what team you’re cheering for? AKA what direction you want your life to go? Knowing which direction you want to go is the first step. Okay so now that you know which direction and which team you’re cheering for, is your team winning or losing?

When you are a spectator whether your team aka your life is winning or losing is totally out of your control. You are just letting life happen to you without any sort of plan and just hoping for the best. But, let’s say that our team is losing. Again, think about it with life in mind. So your life isn’t going great and your metaphorical team is losing. How does it make you feel to watch your team lose from the stands? Frustrated? Angry? Helpless? Disappointed? You can only do so much by being a spectator and cheering or yelling from the stands. In order to have any sort of control over this game you have to make the decision to get on the field. You’ve got to let go of your excuses that you’re not ready or not good enough because if you want to win this game you’ve got to get out there and do the best you can.

Before we focus on being in the game I want to look at the other side of this so you’re still in the stands but now your team is winning. But do you have anything to do with that? No. It is just lucky that your team is winning and things will likely take a turn unless you decide to get into the game.

Okay so now lets focus on being the soccer player. But we’re not quite in the game yet. We’re at our first soccer practice years prior to the game you were just watching. You don’t know anything about soccer but you think it may be fun. Like me, maybe you’re not naturally good at it the first time you try but you keep showing up to practice because you know that the more you practice the better you’ll be. Are you still with me? This concept can be applied to anything in life. You learn by doing. At the first practice you’re not ready to play in that game. You get better by conditioning and preparing through trial and error. Through listening and watching others who have done what you want. It takes time and effort and commitment and sacrifice but you want to be the best soccer player you can be and that’s not going to happen by just thinking about it. You have to be proactive. You have to work hard.

Okay so now we have laid the foundation and you are finally in the game we watched earlier. Things aren’t going well but you’re in the game and you’ve done the work so you use what you’ve learned from practice. Maybe it works and maybe it doesn’t. If it doesn’t work then you adjust and think how can you learn from this moment. How can you use the loss to grow and become a better soccer player so that you can win the next game? You can’t win every single game and not every single moment of life is going to be a success. But embracing and learning from those failures is how you grow into a better version of yourself and you can’t do that if you’re just watching the game. You have to be in the game to adapt.

Apply this to your life as best you can. What do you want in life and are you being an active participant to move your life in the direction you want? Remember, it takes hard work and focus and life won't always go your way but you can learn from those experiences and keep moving forward. You got this!

For more info you can follow me on IG at @stephygthatsme or go to www.showuptogoup.com