Reflections on losing
Sign from the Green Room restaurant in Jaco, Costa Rica.
People like to debate whether Michael Jordan is still considered the greatest basketball player of all time. One thing no one debates is whether Air Jordan has heart. The man lived, breathed and ate basketball, competition and winning. But he's also had his heart broken by loss. I’ve seen him devastated after big games and remember when the news of his fathers death broke; the legendary idol was crushed.
Losing sucks. You lose your keys, you lose the game, you lose a person, you lose a relationship. Obviously there are degrees to which losing impacts you. Lost keys are no equivalent to a loved one. But no one ever felt good about losing anything.
One of my favorite quotes is by “His Airness”:
“I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.”
Sometimes you lose what is not serving you even if you think it might be important or you have an attachment. With relationships we tend to hold on because of what we’ve built or invested. When we intertwine our lives with others and invite them into our world we begin growing roots. So when we pull those roots from the ground, it's very difficult and painful. We aren’t just pulling out the other person's roots. They are joined. We are removing a piece of ourselves.
The more we invest in something and the more equity we put in whether it's financial or sweat equity, or time and then end up losing it all, it is a devastating experience. I understand when I see an athlete get injured and see the tears on their face. The tears are oftentimes not from the physical pain but from the loss of having put so much into training and then seeing it vanish. A torn ACL that ends a soccer season or even a career. A foreclosure on someone's home because of a financial misfortune or the loss of a relationship because people change. They are all devastating.
I’m hopeful though and think of the glass as half full. Sometimes I wish I could turn on a more pragmatic approach to loss. Hoping that, just maybe, all is not lost can create more pain when it doesn’t pan out. I think this is also called denial in the grief process or maybe it's bargaining? I don't know. Trying to keep hope that the game might not be over or things will work out is normal. All the while, knowing deep down that it isn't going to happen. Down by two with three seconds left when the shot goes into the air and clunks off of the rim there really is no hope. All the greats have been there.
Holding on to hope is difficult and for someone like myself I don’t give up easily. I push and push and push to the point of break. In retrospect my own loss at times may have come from my own making. Pushing and pushing for answers, results or change and breaking things in the process. But I can’t sit and wait for life to happen. Having hope in a time of change and realizing that it’s not as much about losing as it is about needing something different is a constructive thought to have despite how painful the fallout might be. The carousel has gone on for too long and sometimes we need to get off and so life has a way of pushing you off if you can’t do it yourself.
The heartbreak is real when we lose. It feels unfair and is entirely out of our control. If we could control it we would make sure it turned out differently. Maybe I wouldn't have gone up for that rebound or maybe shouldn’t have been that rebound. But all is not lost despite how you or I may feel. There are things that you can never lose. Your smile, your ability to make someone else’s day, your quest for the next great adventure.
Just outside of the Main Street of Jaco, Costa Rica down a jungle road is the start of a trail. It’s not marked and the only way you would know to take it is by a local. It’s not listed on any tours and it can’t be googled.
There is an old maroon Jeep parked about a mile down from the start yet there is no road. The location is only accessible by walking, wading and swimming up stream which made me ask “how did this Jeep get here?”
When you arrive there are keys hidden in the dash left by the property owners. With keys in hand you cross a bridge through a gate and into a waterfall wonderland. With each corner you turn the waterfalls double in size until you reach the final wall of water emptying into a pool of turquoise. In order to reach the end you have to climb, scale, leap and crawl up some fairly dangerous and shaky landscapes.
I had set my watch to track the mileage because I do a lot of hiking and I love using technology outdoors to track fitness and exercise. Being extra particular to make sure I set the water function on my Apple Watch I began the journey through each cascade.
As we reached the fifth waterfall there was a ladder with two of the rungs missing and a sheer and rocky drop on both sides. We found a way and made it across to meet a group of people who were turning around at the next waterfall because the bridge that was at the top had been washed out by the last storm leaving only two ropes dangling 50 feet from the top. Without hesitation I knew we would make it but it would not be easy.
After a grueling and terrifying climb we reached the top and found ourselves in an empty paradise. I looked to see our mileage to spot nothing but a white tan line on my left wrist. My watch was nowhere to be found. The sinking feeling of knowing it was lost but instantly. My mind raced to a million different thoughts instantaneously - “it’s probably just back a few feet. No it could be… or maybe I lost it…” It was gone. The jungle had claimed it and the river likely devoured it.
I was so frustrated with the thought of having to go buy a new watch and thinking about the added expense when it hit me. “I don’t actually need it. I like it. I want a new one but at the end of the day it didn’t add that much value to my life”. I thought to myself, “well that was an expensive day” considering how I lost the high priced piece of tech in the process of climbing waterfalls. Then I thought about it and realized loss was real but it was worth it.
How many self help books or memes can you find where a phoenix rises from the ashes through struggle or posters of incredible athletes with a success quote? More than you can count. That is because it is part of the human experience and it is part of our connection to this life. So, as challenging as loss can be, we know there is light because it's not the first time we’ve lost and it won't be the last. But like Michael Jordan even if your heart is broken it's the one thing you can't lose.
