Outside the Sporting Life and Maintaining Grace Under Pressure

     If one looks beyond the rah-rahs and the surface of the final scores and statistics of sporting events, there can be some important life lessons that can be learned from them.    How teams comport themselves, both individually and as a group, as well as how they perform in the face of adversity, can provide lessons for all of us.

     The latest example of this is the Cincinnati Bengals/Pittsburgh Steelers wild card playoff game, held earlier this evening.    This game will go down as perhaps one of the worst examples of a team, in this case the Bengals, allowing defeat to be snatched from the jaws of victory.   From all accounts and judging from having watched the final two minutes of the game, the Bengals have no one to blame but themselves.    The Bengals had a one-point lead going into the final two minutes when the collapse occurred in a bizarre series of events: a fumble by the Bengals running back deep in Steelers territory, and the Steelers being gifted thirty yards in penalties in the final minute due to two unnecessary roughness calls on the Bengals defense.   A long-shot field goal attempt became, while not a chip-shot, certainly easier.   Those penalties were purely mental errors on the part of the Bengals - free yardage due to a lack of composure and focus in that crucial final minute.   The Steelers stayed focused, even in the face of a late deficit that could have ended their season.   Instead, largely because of their lack of focus and poise in the final minute, the Bengals are staying home.

     The life lesson here, is in the importance of maintaining ones focus, ones balance - even in the face of life's emotional highs and lows.   It's one of life's greatest challenges, and our emotional maturity (or emotional intelligence, as this term seems to apply to) is directly related to our ability to achieve this kind of control, the art of maintaining grace under pressure.    Entire areas of philosophy state mastery of our emotions as a central tenant - Buddhism is one of them.  Techniques such as meditation are employed in this pursuit.   I will be the first to admit that I claim no mastery of any of these aspects.   But, I see challenges as providing part of the value of life, and as seen above and in countless other areas of our lives, this challenge is an especially worthwhile one.