DEALING WITH THE CURVEBALLS OF LIFE

We all can probably relate to something unexpected or surprising or disruptive happening to us or to someone in our lives.  Many refer to these moments as “curveballs.”  A curveball in baseball is a pitch that appears to be moving straight toward home plate but is really moving down and to the right or left.  Curveballs are meant to surprise the batter.  And curveballs do indeed take us by surprise when one is thrown our way.  It is what we do with the curveball that makes a difference.

 Take for example one of the curveballs dealt actor John Corbett.  John is an American actor who was born and raised in Wheeling, West Virginia (and who, by the way, was inducted into the Wheeling Hall of Fame in 2004).  After graduating from Wheeling Central High School, John worked as a delivery boy earning $2.65 an hour.   His dad, who lived in California, had offered to help him find a job in the steel industry out there and taking his dad up on an offer, John traveled to California with some buddies.  Shortly after arriving, he began work at Kaiser Steel in Fontana, making very good money as a hydrotester (made sure the welds were tight on the huge pipes the company made).  According to John, “Then one day some pipes came off the assembly line and hit me in the back.  Next thing I knew, I was on disability, walking with a cane, popping painkillers.  Manual labor was out of the question. What was I going to do with my life now?”

Can you relate?  Ever asked yourself, “What am I going to do with my life now?”  Any of us who have dealt with a curveball have probably uttered those words or had that thought.  And how we respond to that question makes all the difference in our lives. John Corbett responded by attending acting classes at Cerritos Community College.  He found that he had a passion for acting.  He was good at it.  He found joy in it.  As he says, “I’m the least likely guy to end up in several hit TV series, let alone star in a Hollywood movie.  Me, a blue-collar kid from West Virginia.”

 We can all be like John and hit the rare curveball out of the park if we take the right approach to the “pitch.”  It is our response to the curveball (and I am sure there will be many that cross our path) that makes all the difference in the world.  We:

• Cannot walk away from the curveball.
• Need to accept “the pitch,” make adjustments, and move on.
• Need to approach it with a calm and open mind.
• Need to take control of our emotions.
• Should view the curveball as an opportunity and use it as a teachable moment; learn from it.
• Have to find the joy in the unexpected; look for the positive.
• Can laugh and look for the humor in the situation.
• Need to take time to clear our mind and open our heart; take a deep breath and calm down.
• Have to keep moving and in a forward direction.
• Must adopt a ‘this too shall pass’ perspective.
• Need to approach the curveball as a challenge rather than as a burden.  
• Can make a list of options for what to do.
• Should try to gain perspective on what happened and keep things in perspective (this is but one pitch in our life).
• We must not personalize the situation.
• Can ask questions to gain information that will help us move forward.
• Can smile.

Curveballs.  Something we would rather not come our way, but more than likely, we will all deal with our share of them.  Remember, it is our choice how we deal or react or respond to the curveballs.   And, how we react determines what happens to us.  We can choose to allow the curveball to paralyze us.  We can hole up somewhere and do absolutely nothing.  We can choose to allow the curveball to get us down, blanketing us in negative emotions (sadness, anger, fear, etc.) turning us into unhappy people.  Or, we can choose to make the best of the curveball, finding the positive in it, and moving onward and upward.

As Brian Tracy (motivational speaker and self-development author) tells us, “You cannot control what happens to you, but you can control your attitude toward what happens to you, and in that, you will be mastering change rather than allowing it to master you.”  Our response will define our quality of life (paralyzed and immobilized; negative and unhappy, or positive and making the best of everything).   We need to not let what happens to us dictate our response.  We can learn to deal positively and productively with the curveballs in our life just as John Corbett did!

BLESSINGS BORN FROM STRUGGLES

 

The June 2016 issue of Guideposts contains an article by Pittsburgh Pirate center fielder Andrew McCutchen titled Struggles Can Be Our Greatest Blessing that caught my eye. McCutcheon’s article speaks to me for two reasons: I often write about the blessings/blessons that challenges bring us and hailing from the Pittsburgh area, I am a Pirate fan and a huge fan of McCutchen’s.

Anyway, McCutchen tells us, “One thing I can promise you, though – no one gets to the big leagues without a ton of effort and more than a few setbacks.” That pretty much sums up life, doesn’t it? It does take a lot of effort to do well on our life’s journey and we are often thrown curveballs along the way. Often these curveballs come in the form of change. And, when we don’t like or want the change, it is easy to just give up instead of dealing with the curveball, the setback, the challenge, the struggle.

This reminds me of the following story: Once upon a time, a wise man met with a king. The king challenged the man with a riddle. He said, “In my hands is a small bird. Is it alive or dead? The wise man paused and looked down. The wise man thought to himself, “If I say it is alive, he will close his hand and crush it. If I say it is dead, he will open his hand and let it fly away.” The wise man turned his head up and said in a soft yet commanding voice, “It’s all in your hands.”

It’s all in our hands – oh, so true. Our lives and our life’s journey is in our hands. Because of what we encounter on our journey – ups, downs, challenges, difficulties, struggles, hard decisions – the journey isn’t easy. Helen Keller said, “The struggle of life is one of our greatest blessings. It makes us patient, sensitive, and Godlike. It teaches us that although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it.”

By definition, a blessing is something that helps you or brings happiness. And, something that at first seems bad, but later turns out to be beneficial or good, is a blessing in disguise. A blessing in disguise is certainly how I would describe a lot of changes. At first the change may seem like the worst thing that can happen to us (loss of a loved one; loss of a job; loss of a relationship; loss of the familiar; loss of sameness, the comfortable; loss of the certain; loss of a tradition; loss of our comfort zone, our sense of security; loss of our sense of purpose and perhaps even direction; loss of control, space, power, social/role identity, or influence). But, once we look beyond what has changed, we might be able to see the blessing(s) that the change holds. As Oscar Wilde said, “What seems to us as bitter trials are often blessings in disguise.”

In his article, McCutchen shared several of his bitter trials, his life’s struggles:

• In 2007, when he was still in the Pirates’ farm system, after a great day of spring training, he was called into the manager’s office (Jim Tracy). Thinking his dream of playing in the major league was to be realized, he instead heard, “Andrew, you’re a very talented player. But…we just don’t feel you’re ready for the big leagues. You still need some seasoning.”   To McCutchen, not ready meant “not good enough.”
• When young, he was concern of never getting noticed as a ballplayer because his family couldn’t afford to send him to travel games.
• Being on a team that had 20 straight losing seasons.
• Dealing with a knee injury.
• Being in a batting slump that according to McCutchen is, “…the worst feeling a batter can have. It’s as though you’re helpless, and every time you’re at bat, the world is watching.”

Things happen all the time as does change. We can choose not to cooperate, but it will still happen. As Evette Gardner said in her April 2010 blog on The Blessing of Change, “But when you move with change, even in amid earth-shattering situations there’s reason to feel joy because you understand that even these situations are not guaranteed to last. Change is always promised…But, you have to go through change willingly in order to come out of it joyfully. There has to be some level of acceptance of your present situation before you can realize peace about it.”

In each of McCutchen’s life struggles listed above, accepting his present situation is exactly what McCutchen did. Although at first he did let Jim Tracy’s comment about needing “more seasoning” eat away at him, McCutchen told himself, “No matter how talented I was told I was, there was room to grow, to learn, to improve. Maybe I could turn struggle into progress. After all, we’re talking about the majors. At that level the sport is teeming with talent! I had to man up and fight on.”

We know that nothing in life is forever. When we accept this premise, we can then see that life gives us these moments, these blessings in disguise to take us to a place (physically, emotionally, and/or mentally) that we need to be in order to accomplish something that is meant to be.

Amaka Imani Nkosazana in Release The Ink tells us, “Tough times don’t last always. Your hard times are there to shape you and develop your character. It causes you to become more aware of life and you develop an attitude of gratitude. Don’t lose hope because it gets better.”   The next time a change, a struggle, a challenge, a setback enters your life, go with the flow of it. Mourn the loss; get angry over what happened, but eventually move on. When you do move on, make choices that help make sense of what happened. Make choices that help bring a ray of sunshine into your and into the lives of others. Make choices that will make a positive difference.

In May 2015, when McCutchen was in the midst of his slump, he prayed, but not for a hit. He “… prayed for understanding. What was I supposed to learn from this experience?” On May 7, 2015 he discovered what he was supposed to learn from the experience. “We were up against the Reds. I got three hits with a run batted in, two runs scored, a walk, a double and a steal. The slump was over. And after losing five games in a row, we won, 7-2. This time it wasn’t a setback. It was a lesson. Trust in time. Trust in yourself. Trust in God.”

As did McCutchen, I hope you look for the blessings in disguise that come your way day in and day out, but especially when you are really struggling with something. Latch on to those blessings and make something positive happen, for you and for others. And remember his words, “Struggles can be our greatest blessings.”