For me sports have always been a love/hate relationship. Some of my greatest moments in life have been celebration of outcomes related to sport. A few of my greatest personal challenges and rewards have also come related to training and performing within an athletic competition. Yet there has also been lots of pain and loss and burnout. There has also been lots of my education generated towards embracing and learning from sport to help out others with talents and opportunities that they have been given.

Yet the thing that is always confusing is how to feel about being a sport spectator. I’m a fan of various teams for various reasons, but I would never consider myself a super die hard fan. Not because I’m not loyal, but more because I know I have no control over the outcome. So while I feel connection to the stories I learn while watching sports and I love watching people do something that they may never do again, it’s hard to get really fired up. I bring this up as this year the Chicago Cubs are in the World Series for the first time in a long while. Their fans are passionate and that’s great, but at the end of the day if their self-worth is tied up into something they don’t have control over it can be a bad deal. While I will admit that I’m a fan of the other team in the series if the Cubs win that’s cool. It’s not that I don’t want my team to win, but above all I just love being in the moment and watching people express their talents, faith, opportunity, and passion in a productive manner.