One of the many things I love about sports is the importance of strategy, especially for those hoping to win at a high level. Whether the opponent is the guy staring back at you from across the net or the golf course itself, without a set plan of attack, chances are, you are going to lose. You might drift for a while. Hit a few good shots. Enjoy a little success. But without a deliberate plan to attack your opponent's weaknesses while at the same time figuring out a way to play to your strengths, success is going to be fleeting.
Unfortunately, I'm 41 years old, and it's taken me nearly that long to figure all of that out. I've always known that sports involve strategy, but I didn't realize that they were driven by strategy. My time for playing sports on a competitive level has come and gone but thankfully I still get to write about them for various publications. As I do, I get to delve into strategy with athletes and I'm always intrigued by the way each one of them approaches the sport he or she plays. Some watch video tape of their opponents in action--looking for a weakness they can exploit. Some use scouting reports. And some talk to "people in the know" about how to win against a particular opponent.
In my experience, far fewer of us have strategies in place in real life. Most of my life has been lived without a strategy. I've always had dreams, but no real way of seeing them realized--other than some obscure hope that they would happen somehow. It all seems rather bizarre when I look back on it now. And while there's nothing I can do about the past, I can do something about today, and tomorrow, and the next day. So, I've been in evaluation mode for the past several months, thinking about my weaknesses and strengths, and thinking about what I want, and then trying to come up with a strategy for getting there.
I'm not leaving God out of the equation by any stretch of the imagination. Instead, I see him as the author of ingenuity, strategy, and the intimate details of life. All the more reason to go hard after such things. This newfound attitude has made me hungry for information about strategy. Last night, I listened in awe while watching the US Open, during which Andre Agassi spoke about something he picked up while playing Boris Becker years ago. He said that Becker, who was notorious for sticking out his tongue while serving, would move his tongue in the direction he planned to serve right before he actually hit the serve.
That's how specific I want to be about life. I don't want to live in a generalized haze where actions, no matter how small they may seem to be, seem insignificant. Instead, I want to be continually processing life to see if I'm in the place I want to be.
