You Gotta Have Heart

I have been a "Life Coach" for most of my adult life and maybe even sooner. I have shared with others based on things I have experienced or observed mainly because others have always seemed to come to me to talk. I have often joked that I was everybody's Big Brother.

It is something that I have not always appreciated. People have always seemed comfortable coming to me to share their thoughts, feelings, fears, concerns, and to often ask for advice. I have not always been comfortable with this because I felt like I did not always make common sense decisions. That is where the beginnings of my Life Lessons began. I would often just share experiences from my life, no matter how bad my own decision making was or how silly I had been.

With age came a little maturity. I started making better decisions and I started taking many of my own life lessons to heart.

The use of the word heart, as I was thinking about this the other day, reminded me of a great life lesson. You Gotta Have Heart. Enthusiasm. Passion. Desire. Drive. And probably a dozen other terms that go into describing what it means to have heart. Unfortunately, having heart is not something that can be taught. You either have heart or you don't. I once heard Mary Lou Retton talking about being a coach and a motivational speaker. Something she said hit home with me. She said, "I can't teach drive. I can't teach passion."

My personal experience in this goes back to my baseball playing days, especially during high school. I was not blessed with the greatest athletic ability. I am better than average for the most part, but there were plenty of people around me that had better natural ability. An interesting note is that I played every position on the field as a regular at one time or another. I was good enough that I deserved a spot on the field but I often had to fill in spots where there were weaknesses. I had an article written about me by the local newspaper my senior year that list my position as pitcher/infielder/outfielder. I was upset because they did not mention that I was also a catcher.

Before I get too far off subject, there were always players that had more natural ability than I had. However, I was often a more vital part of a team or accomplished more than those of with more talent. The one thing that was different was that I had a passion for playing baseball. I didn't become selfish, I thought team first. I could have said I play one position and demand that I play in that position. I found out early on that I loved to win. That often meant playing a position where I was needed most.

I played with many people that had more talent in one finger than I have (or had) in my whole body. More often than not, though, I had more heart. When we would practice and had to do drills, I never cut corners. We would have to do drills that involved repetitions of 50, 75, or even 100. Many of my teammates would cut a few (many) repetitions. I can honestly say that I did every repetition that was asked of me. It was because of this I feel I was able to overcome many of my natural shortcomings.

I had heart. I have learned the same goes for everything that I do. If I have drive, passion, enthusiasm, or any of the elements that make up having heart, I am successful

Going back to Mary Lou Retton's comment, heart is something that cannot be taught. I cannot tell you that you need to do this, that, or anything else to learn to have heart. We each have to look inside of our self to discover how to develop a passion. What about tasks that we dislike. How do we have a heart for something we don't like to do? Again, I can't teach you this but I can tell you how I find heart. With me, it is competition. I love to compete. If I find myself in a project I don't like, I find some way to make a competition out of it. I have to get creative sometimes but if I turn it into a "game", suddenly, I have a much greater desire and often get so involved in a project that I am sad when it ends because competitively I was not where I wanted to be.

Goofy, I know but it works for me. I encourage you to find what it is that helps you to have heart when it comes to things important in your life.

Keep Smilin'!!


© 2009 Eddy Seegers

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