The Lies of Our Fathers

Did you grow up with the big lie? I did. My father told it to me many times and here it is:

"You can be anything and do anything that you put your mind to."

I believed this for the first 17 years of my life before cracks started to form in both the logic and the sensibility of this assertion.

In high school, there was no one on the track team that trained harder than I trained. My specialties were the long jump and the triple jump. These were chosen because I mistakenly believed that there would be a limited amount of running involved. Regardless, I pushed myself through it, knowing that every wind sprint would strengthen my legs. The legs that would propel me over a massive distance and help me land successfully in a giant pit of sand. After the running, there was jumping. Jumping for distance. Jumping for height. Hopping on one leg around the track. Hopping up the stadium steps. There was weight training and stretching. I read books about jumping and mastered the techniques necessary to fly as far as possible. When the meets came, I broke out my 100' tape measure and marked the exact distance I needed to run to hit the board in precisely the right spot. My jumps were pure and clean and beautiful and, usually, good for second or third place. First place? That went to the guys who could flat out fly down the runway and throw themselves into the air. Technique? No. Measurement of their approach? Heck, no. Beautiful and pure and clean? No, no and no. Better than me? Yes. Normally by more than just a little.

No one could deny that I had put my mind to it. But, I was not the high school track star that I wanted to be.

Later, perhaps in my 20's, I was sure that he was wrong, wrong, wrong and the knowledge of his wrongness made me feel lied to and angry.

What if I wanted to be an astronaut?

Sure, as long as you put your mind to it.

Wrong! I get sick on the TeaCup ride at the county fair. There is no way that I would make it in one of those centrifuge spinners. Astronauts can not throw up when they experience a couple of g's, Dad.

In my 30's, I knew he was wrong but I had forgiven him for the lie because I knew that it was a form of encouragement.

What if I wanted to be a professional golfer?

Sure, if you put your mind to it.

Dad, I appreciate it but you and I both know that I don't have enough golfing talent to become a professional. I could practice all day and all night and, although I would get better, I would never get good enough to make a living on the professional golf tour.

You don't know that.

I'm in my 30's now, Dad, and I do know that. You know what, it's okay. The professional golfers could try as hard as they want and not be as good as me at what I do professionally.

Now, in my 40's, I still know he was wrong but I have a new philosophy about the wisdom of the lie. Believing that we are capable of more than what we've experienced so far is intrinsic in our ability to achieve more than what we've achieved in the past.

Do you think I could run a marathon?

Sure, if you put your mind to it.

So, I did put my mind to it a few years back. Until that time, I had run several 10k's in my time but never a marathon. I developed a training program. Bought some decent sneakers. Started running. After a couple of months, I was running for nearly two hours straight. Pretty decent progress and I still had a couple of months to go before the marathon. I decided to enter a half-marathon. I was ready for the half and felt good on race day. Two hours and twenty minutes later, I had finished my first half marathon. A couple of days later I got sick and stayed sick for six weeks. Coughing, weezing. Went to the doctor and got some strong decongestant but it didn't help much. Eventually, had to get an inhaler and a steroid. Finally, I was better but had lost nearly two months training time. I decided to put off the marathon.

After a couple of months of not running, I decided that I could still do a marathon if I put my mind to it. Back to the training. The annual half-marathon rolled around and I entered. Two hours and twenty minutes later, I had finished my second half-marathon. Later that day, I couldn't walk. The next day was worse. Turns out that I had a stress fracture in my right shin. The anterior shin muscle gave up and the bone started taking on too much of the impact. At least that's the reason my doctor gave me. So, I wore a boot for six weeks. Had to put off the marathon again.

Then, I decided that I could still do a marathon. This time, my plan was to build the strength in my legs through weight lifting and running. I started to work hard on my anterior shin muscles to avoid another stress fracture. After a few months, I ran a 10k without incident. By the time the training regimen had gotten me to 9 miles, the familiar pain was back in my shins and I decided that maturity demanded a re-evaluation of the wisdom of continuing to put my mind to accomplishing a marathon.

So, I never did do a marathon despite putting my mind to it. And the lie of my father reared its ugly head once more in my life. But, now I have another perspective.

If I didn't believe that I could run a marathon, I would never have run a half-marathon. And, you know, a half-marathon is a pretty cool thing.

If I had never tried to be a track star, I never would have long jumped 20'.

If you didn't believe you could earn $500,000 in a year, you may never have earned $200,000. If you didn't believe you could be the valedictorian, you may not have made the grades to get in med school. If you didn't believe the best looking girl in your class would go to the prom with you, you might never have met her friend - your future wife.

By stretching our boundaries, we achieve more. We don't always achieve the original goal but so what. That's not really the point our fathers were trying to make. The point they were trying to make is much better summed up by a saying that my mother had about nearly everything:

"You don't really know unless you try."