Winners lose more than losers lose.
Winning for most of the game, my Premier Lacrosse League Carolina Chaos team and I cam up short in the Quarterfinals earlier this month. Before and during the contest, I felt prepared. I felt confident. I felt ready, focused, and determined from the opening whistle to the last one. These feelings gave way to fact: we lost. Our season ended, right then and there. For the hours and days after, a self-critical whisper metastasized into a repetitive roar. The What ifs, the If Onlys, and the Would Should Could haves stormed through my mind. Nevertheless, the past cannot be defeated; it must be put down and let go of.
Have you ever wanted something so badly, worked incredibly hard, sacrificed greatly, yet still lost?
Have you ever experienced the high of being on the right track before an event turns for the worst?
Have you ever yearned, strived, and pursued a goal for an extended period of time but came up short in the end?
Yes. Yes. & Yes. Everyone has.
“If you gaze long enough into the abyss, the abyss gazes back into you,” stated Friedrich Nietzche, the incredibly intelligent philosopher, influential thinker, and stark atheist. This quote emphasizes that staring at evil, pondering wickedness, and looking at darkness for a protracted period could lead to embodiment of such notions. However, this question lingers in my mind to challenge Nietzche’s thought: What’s beyond the abyss?
There are brain waves. There are sound waves. There are light waves. There are no such things as darkness waves. Darkness is the absence of light; therefore, whether it be a location on Earth or within our minds, darkness is destroyed by light. Good triumphs over evil. Brave action conquers the abyss. The steadfast belief in knowing the sun will rise again despite downfall is not only the essence of faith, it’s the requirement for redemption.
If Jesus never resurrected, Christianity would not exist. If responsibility was abdicated after a mistake, the prior rupture remains. When we strive again, despite a loss, we overcome fear and inspire others.
“Be the light amidst the gloom.
The past is a lesson, not a tomb.
The seeds of loss call forth a bloom.”
One of the most inspiring stories I’ve ever come across involves a young girl from Saint Bethlehem, Tennessee…
Born the 20th of 22 children, Wilma Rudolph contracted polio, scarlet fever, and pneumonia early on in her life. Doctors were certain Wilma might never walk again… at least not normally. She wore leg braces until she was a teenager. Determined to defeat these diseases, she chose the sport that would challenge her most: track and field. For months, she repeatedly fell down. For years, she wobbled. Before her 21st birthday, she won three gold medals at the 1960 Rome Olympics, the first American woman to accomplish this three-pronged feat. Articles included verbiage such as “the fastest woman in the world” and “the best running stride the world has ever seen.” How did a girl with polio develop such a beautiful gait? When journalists asked Wilma how she went from breakdown to breakthrough, she replied: “Doctors told me I’d never walk again. My mother told me I would. I believed my mother.”
The only thing the doctors were right about: Wilma would never walk normally again.
The best is nowhere near normal.
When Wilma stared directly and deeply into the abyss, she found the light. Her brilliance came from her unwavering belief, courage, and faith. She embodied bouncebackability.
Finishing a decade of professional lacrosse thus far, I know all too well: this, too, shall pass. The music of a season eventually stops. Celebrations conclude. Pain passes. In the end, only one thing matters: my response. Tomorrow, I will look for the sun’s rise in the morning, seek the light, and then strive wholeheartedly to embody it.
I’ll be back in the gym.
I’ll be back to training.
I’ll be back striving, once again.
To move forward we must bounce back.
Will we stay bitter or get better?
The answer is clear when we understand: winners lose more than losers lose!
— MG