Living to Your Full Potential

This weekend, I was in Chicago for The Concordia Invitational Tournament (CIT), the second-oldest college basketball tournament in the country (older than March Madness!). After trailing throughout their entire first game, our women's team tied it up with two minutes left, took the lead with one minute remaining, and held on to win their first CIT game in recent memory! Unfortunately, the women lost a close, hard-fought championship game. Our men's team lost two close games, with the youngest team at the tournament. Often, we had four freshmen on the court. I had all the freshman guys in my First-Year Seminar class this fall, and it was exciting to see them learn to take leadership on the court and follow the example of the graduating seniors. Watching these guys play their hearts out and the women fight tooth and nail for a win, I have never felt so much pride for our students.

The teams' coaches were spectacular, wholly focused through all forty minutes of each game, pacing the bench, challenging bad calls (of which there were many!), and shouting instructions to their players. Seeing the coaches and players performing to their full potential was inspiring. On the drive home, I pondered how we humans might relate differently if we all had a chance to see each other functioning in our greatest strengths. Perhaps narcissistically, I also wondered, "When am I living to my full potential? What are my championship game coaching and playing moments? What is my court? Who are my teammates and how do we enable each other?"

This evening, I stumbled across the embedded YouTube video of a young prodigy performing "Carry On Wayward Son" by Kansas. If this doesn't inspire you to do what you're created to do, I don't know what will.