My "Crash Davis Belief Statement" Revisited

Last year, duly inspired by yet another viewing of the movie “Bull Durham” on cable, I decided to publicly declare a “Crash Davis Belief Statement“. It wasn’t quite as poetic as Crash (my gosh, what could beat lines like “I believe in the soul, the small of a woman’s back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch……..), but it was a great exercise for me in really getting my arms around what mattered to me.

Here was my original:

“I believe in the incredible potential of the human spirit, the vast underappreciated beauty of the earth, my wife’s smile and the love that radiates from it, long hugs and soft kisses, honesty and courage, incurable optimism, “swishing” 25-footers, movies that make me laugh and cry at the human condition, the Green Bay Packers, a fine hot grande latte, the warmness of friendship, vanilla ice cream, Elton & Bernie, common courtesy, melodies I can’t get out of my head, quad aces, Mom & Dad & my two sisters, servant leadership, government above hypocrisy, titanium drivers, deep cleansing breaths, and God and the Golden Rule.”

Another great thing about this post was that other bloggers picked up on it, and published their own versions of the “statement”. I called them “brilliant ’snapshots’ of our uniqueness as well as our connectedness”.

Now that over a year has passed, I revisited my own statement, and unsurprisingly found that I needed to modify it to “fit” my current place on life’s highway.

Because the beauty of aging is the opportunity to add more knowledge and life experience, and consequently add (or subtract) certain beliefs.

Many of these learnings occurred right here on this page over the past year, so it’s really a “connect the posts” process to update the statement.

Without further ado, here is the 2007 version of my “Crash Davis Belief Statement” (additions in red):

“I believe in the incredible potential of the human spirit, the vast underappreciated beauty of the earth, my wife’s smile and the love that radiates from it, long hugs and soft kisses, weddings and butterflies, honesty and courage, incurable optimism, the men and women in the arena, movies that make me laugh and cry at the human condition, the Green Bay Packers, downward dogs, a fine hot grande latte, the warmness of friendship, the spirit of SOBCon, vanilla ice cream, Elton & Bernie, the Grand Tetons, common courtesy, melodies I can’t get out of my head, amazing grace, Mom & Dad & my two sisters, servant leadership, government above hypocrisy, the daily grind, deep cleansing breaths, the power of dreams, the incredible wisdom of my grandmother, E=MC², and God and the Golden Rule.”

There, that’s better. Next year I’ll take another shot at it.

What about you? If you’ve done this before, would you change it? Or if you haven’t made a “statement” before, can you put on paper what you believe?

Writing it down makes a big difference. Try it.

Have a great weekend!