Fight or die

There are instances in his existence where a man finds himself up against the wall. Shoved there by society, leaned on by life, cornered by circumstance. Lacking the headroom to breathe deeply, the elbow room to move comfortably, the open space to spread his wings. The pressure mounts as he feels his shoulder blades pressing against the cold brick. The darkness envelopes him as he ponders his ever-contracting space, struggling to focus on the thinnest sliver of daylight, his mind no longer able to conjure a light at the end of this black chasm. His lungs are unable to expand, allowing for only the most shallow of breaths . At this, the most defining of moments, he is left to make a choice. Fight or die. Cave, relent and fold up like a cheap tent or continue on resisting, with no promise of survival, with no guarantee that his most valiant of efforts will not be mere acts of futility. The truth that reality TV, network sitcoms and music videos won’t tell you… The fact ignored in your favorite celebrity’s self-aggrandizing blog is that there is dignity to be found in struggle. There is honor to be discovered in your pain and sacrifice, splendor in the ugliness that defines human survival. Life, at its essence, is a war of attrition—the paradoxical situation in which a man must be willing to give his dying breath in his effort to endure, to lose it all in order to win. At the dusk of our days, let the sun not set on your submission, for the true victory you seek may simply lie in having never given up.

Scars

Play til you hear the whistle. If there is one life lesson I’ve carried with me from my youth as a baller it was that simple axiom. Make your move, go hard, take your lumps and finish. You see, we pick up these little “and ones” here and there along the road of life, every time we beat the odds, every time we weather the storm undeterred. A meaningful life isn’t lived tiptoeing through the tulips and running in between the raindrops, skating through our days unscathed. Our time on this earth is defined by taking a beating, absorbing the meanest, most menacing blows this cold world can dish out and finishing anyway. Many of us, in one way or another, live hard. Some of us live for the contact, we take pride in our scars, we welcome the pain. But that isn’t to say we should be so arrogant as to spit in the face of the fates. With the dawn of each day comes fresh opportunity. A chance to start anew, to right the ship, to finish strong. To grow within by identifying the error of our hardheaded ways and make a change. Something in the way I’ve been wired makes it impossible for me to understand the sort of shoulder-shrugging acceptance and resignation with which some people view their destiny. Each day I’m blessed enough to open my eyes, as I see it, is square one. Take advantage of this new chance, this clean slate ushered in by the rising sun. Take back control, exercise your will and take measures toward creating a better life, if not for this day, then for the night that will surely follow. Every goal in life is the same as those many brief moments of decisive action. Make your move, go hard, take your lumps and above all else finish.