DANCING WITH GOLIATH

Merely looking at his burly figure, I knew that if he punched my face, my handsomeness would be distorted; and that if he grabbed my neck, I was more or less dead! So, going toe-to-toe with him wasn't anywhere close to being a very good idea. I needed another tactic to tackle him, to take away his strength advantage, to not lose the fight.

I chose the element of surprise. It was a calculated risk. It was either going to work or I was going to pay the price of failure. Either way, I had little or no time to settle down and come up with another plan; and, besides, what other tactic would work against the boy mountain in front of me, whose desperate spoil for a fight could already see him hurtling towards me in anger?

As he came in to tango with me and possibly hand on me one of those powerful fists of his, I crouched under him and grabbed him by the waist. Then, in one full swoop, using his momentum towards me, I moved slightly back, put as much strength in my legs as I possibly could, and lifted him sky high. And still in the same swoop, I banged him against the ground with all the force that I could muster!

Everyone was stunned...the bully, the crowd and even me! It even took me a while to realize my victory. But in the instant that it took me to realize it, I knew victory wasn't complete until I had stuffed the mouth of my fallen adversary with sand. So I started scooping and pumping sand into his mouth as he dazedly and frantically tried to fend me off. Within seconds my friends and some of his supporters had yanked me off him, and I found myself riding on the shoulders of my friends. It felt very good to win...for once!

True story. It happened when I was in elementary school.

We all have goliaths to face in our lives, and it doesn't necessarily have to be a person; it could be anything that causes us untold and painful distress. That we have such opposition though does not mean that our lives are over or that we can never make progress; neither does it mean that we must always cower in the face of whatever person or circumstance is bullying us. We cannot afford to give up.

I'm not implying that adverse situations that we face are powerless against us or cannot harm us. No. I'm instead advocating that every giant we come up against must have a weak point, which we can locate and take advantage of. If no such weak point exist, then it would imply that such a giant is perfect...but in truth there are no perfect people or perfect situations (good or bad) on this planet. So, the giant can be beaten, we just have to find out how. 

Running away from our challenges with the hope that someday or somehow they will eventually disappear is an illusion we simply cannot afford to have if we truly want to live satisfied or fulfilled lives. In reality, life itself isn't a joy ride until you're able to conquer your challenges and ride on them! We stay with what we accept and fight what we don't. And the giants before us we really cannot afford to accept, we just need to fight.

But our fight must be guided by wisdom...

1.  We should learn how best to apply our own strengths to any situation.
2.  We must never go toe-to-toe with our challenges but instead always look for better ways to tackle the problems.
3.  We must be willing to fight till the end and give it all we've got.
4.  We must show no fear and be confident in ourselves otherwise we would have already lost the battle before it has even begun.

This year, we need to resolve in our minds that those things that constantly bullied us in times past will stop being a recurring decimal in our lives. We've had a dance too many with them and it's time the dance came to a permanent stop.