I've written a few times in this blog about my love for sports; how watching athletes dig down and find hidden reserves when their backs are against the wall inspires me over and over again. Yesterday, I had another opportunity to observe a sporting event that brought out the very best in two impossibly rich young men who, by the end of their meeting, looked as if they would rather crumble to the ground in exhaustion than relinquish their goal of taking home that trophy.
Modern day tennis matches are the equivalent of civilized boxing matches. Two warriors stand on opposite sides of the net, slugging it out until one of them can claim victory. Grand Slam finals are the ultimate goal, the end game that all the pros aspire to but usually the matches leading into the final are more exciting, more in doubt than anything that transpires in the final. Not this time. This time the Australian Open Men's Final produced an amazing display of physical endurance, consummate skill and sportsmanship. For 5 hours and 53 minutes, two athletes at the peak of their powers showed their fans what never giving up looks like. Through multiple momentum shifts and shots that missed their mark by centimeters, both men behaved as true champions and, at the end, there wasn't anyone in that stadium who wouldn't have wanted to take a chainsaw to that trophy to split it in two.
Right now, my daughter is going through one of the most difficult challenges of her life. She is trying to dig down and find her hidden reserves to defeat an opponent that is every bit as inexhaustible and unrelenting as those two men facing each other across the net. Like a world class athlete, she is using every resource at her disposal to give herself the tools she needs to triumph. The last step is searching her soul and finding the belief that she can be victorious.
No one will be cheering louder when she finally claims her trophy.
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