Being victorious

Sitting in the stands just to the right of us during one of the Dolphins home games when they had their perfect season was a group of people clothed in yellow and black. They had definitely come to party. They stood for nearly the entire game, sang songs, danced in the aisles, and every now and again broke into a chant that none of us could understand until the about the third or fourth time through. Those of us who watched yesterday’s Super Bowl game could hear it in the background amongst the other cheering … “Who dat, who dat, who dat say dey gonin’ to beat my Saints?” Well, yesterday it wasn’t the Colts turn to beat the Saints! It was a long journey, often painful for the Saints to finally arrive where few teams end up … Super Bowl Champions!

But victory is so fleeting. Here today, gone tomorrow. Oh, the celebration along Bourbon Street in New Orleans will be going on for many days, but eventually work beckons, the money runs out, and the hangovers takes over the body. Victory is so fleeting especially when next season starts up and your beloved team ends up losing a game or two or more. And then, another team holds up the trophy at next year’s game.

We like to associate ourselves with winners. We believe that just maybe, if we get close enough to a winner, it might just rub off and we can become winners too! Not only do we like to associate ourselves with winners, there is buried deep within our psychic the need to be a winner. For far too many of us we have picked up somewhere along the path of life that we simply do not measure up … that we can never be the winner ... that there is something wrong with us and no matter what we accomplish or do it just won’t change the reality that we are not worthy of being called a winner.

Well, there is another reality … a reality that I have to keep reminding myself almost daily. It is a truth basic to life itself and it doesn’t come via a victory by your team in the artificial setting of a football game one evening during the year. This truth is: “I’m somebody because God don’t make junk!” When God created the human person he stepped back and said, “That’s good!” You are a winner so dance the dance, sing the song, and enjoy the game of life for victory is yours!

Quote for today: “Err on the side of generosity: You get more by first giving more.” Danny Meyer