Sometimes He gives me a word. I usually keep these to myself or share them with a few, but today it is impressed upon me to share with you. So here it is, and I hope it means something to you today:
Surrender the outcome.
You want to know how hard this is to do in my current profession as a high school special education teacher and the coach of 12 teenage girls trying to play the team sport of basketball? Lord, have mercy. Now you know why I sit with God every morning.
Every Tuesday and Friday night, I am on a sideline in a gym somewhere. Last Friday, it was at Thomas Coliseum in Haltom City, coaching the final pre-season game before we begin our two month district run.
Our junior varsity team led the whole game, but I couldn't shake the feeling that we were behind because we were not playing up to our potential. We ended up losing the game by 1 point, and I was ridiculously frustrated. Not because we lost, but because we didn't play together. If you asked what my goal is for any team I coach, it's that they play together. The motto this year with this group is "play hard, play together." Those that know sports understand when you do those two things, the whole winning part usually takes care of itself. And we have had some great team victories this season.
At the end of the game, I looked around the small, square locker room at the twelve pairs of eyes staring at me, some of them briefly dropping to the cold, concrete floor in shared frustration. Sometimes I wish I could know what these inconsistent and precious and crazy and hormonal and hard-working and stumbling and cranky and funny and lovable and exasperating (ok, you get the picture) girls are thinking. Other times, I embrace the ignorance with a certain patience that comes from knowing I'm no different. Coaching is one of the greatest callings on the planet, and if you do it right, it comes at a great emotional cost.
It's worth it though. The journey is worth every bit of sacrifice, and ultimately the victories I am after are not the ones that show up on the scoreboard, but in the lives of these girls.
I cannot count how many times I wake up in the night sorting through what I should say or do, what I shouldn't have said or done. I have lost track of how many times I have pleaded with these girls to do this or that, or don't do this or that. For a competitive control freak like me, I want results, and I want them yesterday. I want to have my hands fully locked around the future and be able to speak the outcome into existence with enough cajoling and prodding and even manipulating when I get desperate. But that is an exercise in futility, so for the sake of my sanity, I'm trying to learn how to surrender.
Please tell me I'm not the only human who struggles with this around here. Odds are you are not a basketball coach, but I'm guessing you have goals and plans and things you are tempted to control. I'm assuming you are currently pouring your heart and energy into someones for something. Maybe it's into your own flesh and blood kids. Perhaps it's your job. Maybe your health is running wild and you are trying like mad to control what will happen tomorrow. Perhaps it's the unknown that is keeping you up at night.
We have all heard the saying "control the controllables," or the famous saying that goes something like, "help me change what I can, accept what I can't, and have the wisdom to know the difference."
My prayer every morning is for wisdom, but it's also for deeper trust to simply let go of my desire to control my surroundings. Heck, I can't even control my own self half the time.
So God being good as He is, often settles my soul with gentle reminders. He reminded me this week of a truth I will lean on for the next two months: surrender the outcome. Keep showing up, keep loving and leading, keep working hard toward goals, but in the end, let it be whatever it will be.
And odds are, whatever that is, will be good. Whether it is victories on the scoreboard or victories that are being sown in the future lives of some very special young ladies, I am simply thankful I get to be a part of it.
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