I just opened the freezer on a dreary Thursday morning during winter break and grabbed the cookie dough (I don’t bake by choice). It’s nearing time to go back to teaching but today I’m ’bout to eat these cookies in the middle of the day. Let me tell you why…

See, I never learned much about vacationing as a child; I didn’t know how to rest. It seemed optional and my revisionist history would like to assert that almost every time I sat down, a grown up told me how damned lazy I was. Can I get an amen? But then I became a teacher. Let me break it down a little bit and explain why authentic people must value rest and rejuvenation.  Notice I didn’t say sleep as that is a clear given. Americans are always in a state of sleep deficit from overcompensating at work or play. As we embrace rejuvenation, however, we create space to think about purpose and all of the motivations that either enliven or pollute us from day-to-day.

Crawling to the halfway mark of this school year, I went to winter break reeling from some of the interactions I’d had with various adolescents. Most of my episodes with students are generally positive but when confidence is lacking and more specifically when a person has only known “put-downs” and emotional destruction they erupt in class sometimes with soundbites like, “Fuuuuuuck, can you just stop talking Mr. Coulter?” or “What the Fuck Mr. Coulter? I gotta answer all these questions?” Sometimes I get, “I’mma fuckin’ throw this book at you…watch.” To the young lady who threatened me I probably stepped out of line when I dared her to make good on that promise. She opted not to do so. As a note of clarication, I don’t work in a “problem school” or a “Low-income” neighborhood.

These students are not as anomalous as you might think; they’re just more expressive than most. They aren’t the bane of my existence but what has made them cynical, self-proclaimed helpless and jaded is my crown of thorns. I’m almost physically ill at the sound of a child choosing failure because he or she has never been ushered toward triumph.

But the most difficult posture for a teacher to maintain is one of hope. Teachers (which could be a metaphor for “humans”) probably lack hope for their own lives on any given day. It’s not a merit-based system in teaching so there is a point of no return career wise and once you’re in and all the way to the right of the pay scale, then what? And money aside, what of personal loss? Teachers lives get turned upside down because the rain ain’t ever played favorites. The teacher is like the Giver who can see the end from the beginning. Teachers can see in color but 180 days of black and white will absolutely dull a vibrant spirit . Kids are a little different now, often less respectful and even less optimistic despite all of their admirable traits. So if you’re not fulfilled or at least rejuvenated regularly, you’ll be blunted by reality. This is the looming threat for people ignoring…wait for it…themselves. Being blunted means being weakened in force. God gave you “force”. In my faith tradition, force in our human frame is rooted in having been created in the image of God. But alas, when that force is muted, dilapidated or siphoned by the vitality leeches, the outcomes are usually harmful to self and others. That’s why so many teachers hate their jobs and perhaps even their own mundane lives.

At any rate, the cookies smellin’ really good right now and my windows are open here at home. I’m drinking coffee out of one of my fave cups and while I need to grade papers, I’m just enjoying the space, the quiet, and a reading a Catholic friend shared with me at a retreat last week. I’m not saying teachers need vacations. I’m saying WE humans need to prioritize the things that bring color back to us. Vacations make you hate work. Rejuvenation reminds you of the real you that should be going to work everyday and/or invites you to stop compromising and move toward the work meant for you.  Eat cookies, rest (from TV and noise as well as work related activities) and see if you start to breathe. You can’t give to others what you haven’t nourished in yourself.

Almost 20 years ago I earned a B.A. in print journalism from Chapman University and in the process worked for several news outlets, freelancing and honing a writing craft I thought would become a lifelong profession. I was journalism student of the year when I graduated and had departmental honors. That was 1997.

By 1999 I no longer worked in the field and was headed to Fuller Theological Seminary which led to a five-year stint in full-time Christian church work. As far as my faith is concerned, ain’t nothin’ changed but the time but I ain’t working for a church anymore either. So my Lakeside Fantastic Voyage landed me in secondary education as an an English teacher working on a Ph.D. in Leadership Studies. And yesterday my pilgrimage circled back around to the seminal roots of journalism.

I was invited to participate in Chapman University’s 3rd annual Excellence in Journalism conference as a panelist addressing the topic of Race & Society. I haven’t published anything in a newspaper since the Clinton administration and I’m sure I was the only non-journalist droppin’ knowledge yesterday. But just because you’ve never worked in politics, so-to-speak, doesn’t mean you can’t be…uh hold that thought.

I didn’t belong, but here’s why I actually did and you might find this is true for you as well. When you’re invited to a party where everyone speaks a language you don’t, knows intricate details you’ve forgotten or offers and expertise you “almost” had, consider three questions:

1. Why were you invited in the first place? (In my case, my career has required many of the same skills used by journalist daily and I have mastered a core skill set that offers journalism students key considerations.)
2. What’s the connection between your expertise and the focus of the seminar, workshop or speaking engagement? (Empathic listening skill development, critical thinking and scholarly approaches to research were my contribution
3. How can you expand your network through an experience of “not belonging”?(Simply engaging and speaking with energy as someone who felt he had something to alter allowed me to initiate dialogue with the audience and the other panel participants.)

Because I could answer these questions, the journalism conference became electric and felt native. It was a catalyst for career growth and a reminder that not all industry professionals are smug. In fact, everyone I interacted with were both gracious and accomplished in their respective journalistic fields. We consisted of a documentarian, a television reporter for a major network, a free-lance veteran, an LA Times writer and a political writer for an up-and-coming political news source.

Thinking you don’t belong is natural; letting it deter you is something you have the power to alter. Be afraid and show up anyway. The benefits will enlarge you and those who hear you.

Researcher Julia Galef recently offered great insights on the idea of a Scout mindset vs. Soldier mindset pointing out that most people see their interactions with others as a competition. Somebody’s gotta win and somebody’s gotta lose reflecting the philosophy of an unreformed “Ricky Bobby” (Talladega Nights 2006).

Samuel Clemons, better known as Mark Twain said that the two most important days of one’s life are the day he or she was born and the day that person discovers why they were born. We search for meaning seemingly by nature of how we were designed and that inquisitive attribute cannot coexist with hate, oddly enough. Yet hate and dehumanization flow methodically and constantly through the blood stream of America like tree sap in 2016. It could be argued that the advent of social media was like handing virtually everyone on earth a microphone with no one in the sound booth to cut the mics. And so searching for purpose or living it out seems to have taken a backseat to low-budget preaching late at night after a trying day or a national catastrophe.

But a military fighting force without the ability to understand its enemy is useless and destined for mass casualties. Americans expect and practically demand a solider-like allegiance in order for there to be peace. And so we criticize Colin Kaepernick (San Francisco 49ers) because he won’t stand for the playing of the Star Spangled Banner (American National Anthem). Donald Trump supporters speak in a vernacular that supposes they are the only ones who want America to be great. The National Rifle Association fears the abridging of Americans’ right to bear arms and anti-gun advocates often discount that apprehension. It’s hard and maybe even impossible to have dialogue with a soldier mindset.

The scout is somewhere perched in a tree or embedded behind enemy lines to survey and assess for the sake of reporting back to her or his command. Information gives his forces intel they need to succeed in the theater of war. But what of America’s war right now? Could a scout’s mindset reveal that our ideological civil war is first addressed inside of ourselves? On any given day, any truth that comes out of our mouths about religion, education, politics, racism can be both true and false in some aspects. Americans like tradition if it’s their own and we love a winning team so we drop anchor where it makes sense and tend to lock out alternative viewpoints wholesale.

But a truth worth surrendering to is that scouts watch, listen and observe which is hard to do if mouths are always runnin’ like bath water. Are we really a nation of control freaks unwilling to engage discourse and exchange perspectives so that we might understand…not convert…but understand? Conversion is in the heart of an individual and, I believe, prompted by power far greater than our own. Authentic leadership of self and others has to involve bravely “scouting” and reporting…and I’ll add…transforming if it’s required.

“My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to become angry.” (James 1:19 [New International Version])

Troll Facebook news feeds if you must today and before you “un-friend” (which was never meant to be a verb by the way), think of a question that will help you understand…and ask it.

In a Twitter poll, I said, “True or False…People spend a lot of time in the mirror because they like the way they look.” Guess how many people called b.s.? Seventy one percent said, “FALSE!” The sample size was small but maybe a moral to that conclusion is that  people spend more time trying to fix themselves preparing to live out purpose. By the way, that’s called theme.

There’s multiple themes to life and they show up constantly in movies leaving an aftertaste for contemplation. You agree? Themes are the universal truths about life that we often see, process and maybe forget if it’s too overwhelming. You know the archetypes of the noble heroines and heroes who fight the right battles but fall to cowardly cheaters. It messes with us, challenges, discourages us and all in two hours. Pay your money, sit in the dark with mostly strangers and watch, laugh, cry, judge, resonate or all of the above. Movies move. Am I lying? And they’re good at presenting to us a mirror.

Enter Rocky Balboa, a character who, though mythical, has a statue in Philly. Damn! I mean there’s a statue of Magic Johnson, Wayne Gretzky, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and even Oscar De La Hoya outside of the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Not sure if the last guy is in the same echelon as the others but this they have in common; they’re real human beings.

But back to this Rocky Balboa. The latest in the series of these movies is Creed which focuses on the “illegitimate” son of the late Apollo Creed, nemesis turned best friend of Rocky (Sylvester Stallone) who died in the ring in 1984 fighting a steroid-using Russian. While Apollo was losing his life and a battle with his own pride, refusing to accept that he was beaten, his mistress was pregnant with Adonis Creed. Us Rocky fans had no idea of this subplot in 1984. I was nine and didn’t have the savoir faire to consider the possibility that Apollo had the Eye of the Tiger in more ways than one. Kudos to screenwriters who can spot a cinematic opportunity.

But to the themes. Adonis Creed is an orphan, despite being the son of a boxing “god.” He fights everyday in the juvenile detention center where he lives until finding refuge in the unlikely care of his father’s widow, Mary Anne Creed (Phylicia Rashad). She raises him like a son and gives him the normative life he would never have had otherwise. Who knows why she did it.

Thematic pause for thematic station identification. The beauty of themes lie in the universality. They apply to all in one shape or form. Themes unite us unmistakably. Consider these themes:

1. Forgiveness of others often allows one to fulfill a higher sense of service to humanity  – Mary Anne Creed raises the extramarital son of her deceased husband.
2. Unintentional or intentional duplicity is a common affliction – Apollo Creed was publicly heralded as a hero but was privately unfaithful to his wife. Adonis Creed meets his love interest Bianca (Tessa Thompson) but fails to reveal that he is the son of one of the greatest fighters of all time and she has a cow about it.
3. Self-Denial and/or Self Hatred Threatens even the most confident of us– Adonis Johnson [Creed] goes by his mother’s last name until a fight promoter insists he use his paternal surname to trump up ticket sales and interest. It’s a fundamental struggle for Adonis who, as far as he’s concerned, never had a father.
4. Even our closest friend(s) don’t know us as well as they think they do – Upon surfacing in Philadelphia to pursue training with “Unc” [Uncle Rocky], Balboa is utterly surprised that Adonis even exists. Apollo Creed was the loud braggart who somehow also possessed the genuine ability to draw our courage and resilience when necessary. Nevertheless, perhaps due to circumstances following Apollo’s death, Rocky was never privy to knowledge of this particular Creed heir.
5. Hubris (Egocentric Pride) is somehow related to fear and WILL cripple even the strongest of us –  Apollo expressed this more than 30 years earlier just before his death (Rocky IV) at the hands of Ivan Drago, the human experiment engineered to establish Russian athletic superiority. The elder Creed refused to accept his limitations and feared humiliation so much that it cost him his life. Far less severe, Adonis is knocked out one day after mouthing off to a champion in a practice gym. To bring the universal application all the way into focus, In the movie Creed, Rocky Balboa himself initially resigns to not fight a cancer diagnosis despite having fought odds his whole life. Cancer reminds him of his late wife Adrian who died of the disease. Everywhere you look, it seems, there’s the smell of “macho” attempting to disguise the stench of fear.
6. Longing for a Father’s approval…enough said. But I’ll say it anyway. Ain’t gonna lie. I cried over this one in the theater…the dark theater. Adonis didn’t want to fight under the name “Creed” for fear of disgracing the boxing lore of a legendary father he never met. Even in his orphaned reality, Adonis strove to find his own identity while attempting to preserve the Creed name. It was as if he sought his dad’s approval from the grave.

The thing about themes, the truths presented in life and literature, is that we can only deny their validity. We can’t disprove it. Themes are only validated if they happen to lots of people or if lots of people say, “Uhhhh….that right there? That’s totally me.” When I saw Creed, the list of themes above started flowing. I wiped tears, trying not to get my “ugly cry” on and thought this is unbelievable. Themes scream at us and allow us to select one, some or all but certainly not none. Pretending that themes don’t apply to us personally is a death certificate. It is DEATH a la Apollo Creed to exclaim that “That was then and this is now. I’m good.” That’s the trickery of the thematic right? It’s the thing you see happening to everybody while you swear (based on your faith, convictions, pedigree, intellect or whatever) that the s*#! can’t happen to you. Ah but “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall (Proverbs 16:18).

But good and bad themes co-exist. I just happened to list the most striking negative ones from the movie and its context. Don’t you think of your own duplicity, failure to be the same all the time, and spiral into shame? Or do you ever consider how your pride in your strongest traits builds a soap box from which to judge others? It’s a tough thing, maybe the toughest thing in life to evaluate ourselves.

But for each of the “Balboan” themes I referenced there is a transcendent redemption, triumph that could not be realized without the fire of vulnerability. Apollo died before he could combat his greatest demons. On the contrary, Adonis recognized (late) at about age 31 that boxing was something he ought to seriously pursue. He went and found uncle Rocky and gave his dream some space to breathe.

Mrs. Creed gave life to someone she owed nothing and Rocky conquered a fear of death and fought cancer (Of course we don’t find out how severe the disease is.) Adonis wants to be significant, which is a theme all by itself. He achieves it in a loss to a ranking champion whom he bloodily battles in the movie’s climax.

In ancient Greek, Caananite and Hebrew culture, the name Adonis means Lord with implicit connotations of beauty and all surpassing value. As I watched his development, Adonis Creed possessed incredible power. He was unsure of his identity and yet powerful because of it. He was birthed from an unsanctioned relationship but reclaimed into the most unlikely but genuine relationships of mother-to-son a person could desire. Those who loved him most throughout his early life shielded him and deterred him from following in the family trade and yet purpose and tenacity found residence in him to propel him toward a redeemed life.

Rocky movies man…if they ain’t the truth…