View from the starting line …

As I stepped out onto the track, all I could see was a string of intimidating hurdles.

Some time during my junior high school years, track events became part of the physical education activities at my school. I had never jumped hurdles before, so checking out the scene that first morning on the track was something new.

As I looked at the rows of hurdles, I pictured myself stumbling over the first one, falling head first and lying there on the track, dead from a broken neck. It was a dramatic emotion, but the hurdles seemed to present a dramatic challenge.

Nonetheless, they had to be jumped, so I summoned all the courage I could, listened closely to the coach’s instruction about how to successfully clear the hurdles, then lined up for my first run. I was nervous, even a little scared, but I was also intent on succeeding.

With the shrill of the coach’s whistle I was off the starting line and hit my strides well to jump the first hurdle, which I cleared beautifully! The second I jumped the first hurdle, I instantly learned how to jump hurdles. I continued to clear each of the remaining hurdles except for slightly clipping the second to the last one, which caused me to immediately correct my stride in order to clear the last hurdle.

By the time I finished the run around the track, I was invigorated by having succeeded in (literally) clearing a new set of hurdles, a new challenge.

Track events never became my favorite activity, but I learned something very important that first day on the track: you have to get over that first hurdle in order to succeed through the series of hurdles between you and the finish line. Once you face and clear the first hurdle, most of the anxiety dissipates or even disappears as you realize you can clear the barriers and finish well.

The key is clearing that first hurdle. That’s where we tend to psyche ourselves out with imagining the fall that causes the broken neck. We envision everything that can possibly go wrong, and then expect it. However, if we listen closely to the “coach” about how to clear the hurdle successfully, focus and apply our best effort, we clear that first hurdle and, in the process, realize we can clear the others in our paths as well.

Most of us lining up for our first run at hurdles had some anxiety before we started, and a little elation when we ended. There were a couple who so terrified themselves as they stared at the hurdles that they never ran the race. They failed because they wouldn’t even try to jump the first hurdle.

What hurdles are lined up in front of you today? Are you gathering courage and taking on that first hurdle, or generating fear and making excuses for not even getting off the starting line? What will it take for you to take on that first hurdle?

Scotty