Extremely Refreshing

Recently I read an article related to college football. The article was describing an exchange between Alabama’s head football coach Nick Saban and the press. A reporter asked about a player who had missed some practices and wanted to know if the player had done enough to move up the depth chart. Saban’s response was “Well, that’s up to him. He knows what he’s supposed to do at practices, he knows what he’s supposed to do. This is not a democracy. Everybody doesn’t get to do what they want to do. Everybody doesn’t get to do what they feel like doing. You’ve got to buy in and do what you’re supposed to do to be a part of the team and do the things you need to do in practice every day- a sense of urgency, execute, do your job.”

I found this statement to be extremely refreshing. It just screams loud and clear a term, value, or character trait that seems to becoming more and more rare. Personal responsibility. The coach has his job that he is doing. The other teammates have their job that they are doing. The team has clear rules and expectations and it is up to each individual member of that team to follow them. Ultimately, the entire team’s success depends upon each member taking personal responsibility to do their clearly defined part.

I know how this coach feels. He would love to just make this young man do his job because he sees his potential. He sees something that this player doesn’t see. He sees that he is really good, but he could be great, he could be world class. He could be so much better than even his best days. Unfortunately, the player sees distractions. The player feels like he just needs to take care of some other things first. The player is ok with putting the work on hold while he tends to some other things that are screaming really loud to him. What he doesn’t realize is that the window of opportunity is slowly closing. His potential is slipping away little by little every day that he is not fully invested.

The coach knows this because he has seen it before. He has witnessed potential greatness slip away and vanish into thin air. I would dare speculate he may have even experienced it in his own personal life at some level. From experiences like that, the coach knows the lasting pain of regret far outweighs the temporary pain of commitment.

Over the weekend I communicated with a colleague who had just reached a 10- year milestone of being infected with Lyme disease and overcoming it. She was bounced from doctor to doctor with crazy diagnoses that were way off the mark. She said “It took my strong will, personal responsibility, and my amazing husband, children, family, and loved ones to help support me through this. It took training of my mind and body to be strong and I know this experience set me on the path to becoming even stronger.” She accomplished this all without allopathic drugs or antibiotics. She did it by buying into a philosophy that her body had the ability to heal if she put in the work necessary.

We field calls everyday from people who want to get healthy, followed by others that call with the excuses why they can’t today because something came up. Both of those are tough calls to take because they both involve personal commitment. Accepting someone under our care takes a personal commitment by us to do our job at 100 percent all in. The other call is tough to take because we see the window of opportunity slowly closing with each excuse as to why today is not going to work. People ask me all the time, “when do you think I am going to start to feel better?” Paraphrasing coach Saban, “Well, that is up to you.”

Lombardi Chiropractic Family Health Center
1116 Upper Lenox Ave.
www.lombardichiropractic.com
(315) 363-4114

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