Reposting this as I sit here and re-evaluate “this life”…. this was from 2003-2004 under the old “Tribal Courage” blog…much still applies since we all suck and find ourselves falling back into bad habits.
To be checked out. Seems like I have been taken out of the battle more lately than I ever hoped to be. Odd thing is–its been situations that don’t normally bother me.
The past few weeks I’ve been developing new management training courses for my company. Day and night–this is all I have been focused on. All the things that seem to matter most have taken a back seat. Important things like prayer, spending time with my family, spending time with myself, calling to check on my band of brothers, oh yea– and time for God. So I carved out time for two important events today. The first was an all out mountain bike assault combined with a little “geocaching”. Geocaching–heard of it? It a new sport–very similar to an exercise we used to do in the military when GPS units became part of our map and compass training. It a sport where you use your GPS device and find hidden caches. In the caches is usually a log book and some kind of memorabilia. Today I signed my name to the log book and took a finger puppet as a prize for my effort. In return I left an old Susan B. Anthony dollar.
The second item on today’s agenda was to take my 3-year old out to play. Putt-putt was scheduled but the sign that said “year round” didn’t include Mondays and Tuesdays as part of that year. So we sacrificed and found ourselves at the playground in the nearest McDonald’s. So after 40 minutes of stairs, slides, smiles, and sticky seats we headed back to the house. She worn out from the play- me worn out from the Happy meal I picked at in addition to my “Number 1- Super-sized”.
My realization is this. We work hard- but we also have to play hard. And in the end–getting a cool toy in the bottom of a burger bag or in a sealed bucket in the middle of the woods is an extra bonus. The real prize is the time we spend with those we love.