A Time to Sit Down

It’s not accurate to say I sat the bench my whole career because I didn’t. But sitting on the side when you’d rather be in the game affords some strange lessons. You begin to wonder why you signed up, tried out, accepted the scholarship, etc. The photo is the reason I decided to start writing about lessons learned through what the world commonly calls failure. The photo is without a caption because I was at a loss for words when I wrote this post. What words go under this picture? Hmmm. I can tell you what words go above it. “Warm it up Norman!” I wrote that statement on a piece of an index card in college and attached it to this photo then placed it on my wall in my dormitory next to about 70 other posters and magazine photos of NBA players. There it was – the collage of greatness featuring players from KG fresh out of Farragut Academy to The Admiral David Robinson formerly of the San Antonio Spurs. Then there was this picture of me enjoying a moment with teammates at the tail end of a blowout against an opponent I don’t even remember. To me the picture represented failure, a constant reminder that I wasn’t good enough to play big minutes throughout college. It took me roughly 10 years to realize that this photo represented growth, resilience and so many other qualities that we need to make it through life. 10 years means that I was 31 when I could reminisce about basketball without feeling like a loser.

But for young athletes and old ones too I’m hoping your “bench shot” doesn’t remind you that you’re a loser. A loser? Name somebody who hasn’t lost. Kobe Bryant once said something to the effect that “I’m not with that losing stuff; I don’t believe in those moral kinds of victories.” Man, I was feeling him when he said that. Sometimes you want to win so badly it produces nausea. No joke. But really, not to sound like a man in love with being punched in the face but everybody really does lose, suffer disappointment and negotiate the emotions of shame and embarrassment. Kobe might hate to lose but he’s had to learn to accept it when it happens because no to do so would drive a competitor insane. Trying to be perfect is admirable but lacking the capacity to accept imperfections makes the earth, your country, your state, your city an impossible place to reside. Imperfection surrounds us with the rumors spread about us, the selfishness, impatience, carelessness. The “bench” was the training grounds for dealing with some of life’s greatest challenges. Would I do it over again? No. That’s why you don’t get to go back in time and relive the hard parts of life or any part for that matter. The events of life stand alone isolated in time forever. I feel as though God did for me what I would’ve never done for myself to teach me what I now know – that life is about my mission to offer humanity greatness. My battle was never with a coach, the starters or my ego. My battle was with self. I learned to be excellent, disciplined, patient, respectful, ruthlessly competitive, faithful and ironically I learned it all from a seated position on a folding chair.

“There’s some funny storytellers in this world. Who the heck would make up some (expletive) like that?”

– Charlie Murphy