"The Contender"

                                       by Monica Petter


  There was a ringing deep inside my head. All the sounds around me seemed to blur into the nothingness, the monotony of the ringing. Mouths moved, faces contorted, tempers flared. I just watched as if I were a bird on my own shoulder, disconnected somehow. Just listening. Really listening to what was not being said, not being done.

  Suddenly, all emotion left me and I was objective, separate from the situation. I was higher than it, lost in thought. I could see what I had been swimming through all this time. Clarity. It wasn’t nauseating or irritating, it was manic.

  A circle of people who were supposed to be a team talking around each other but never to each other. Each having a viewpoint, but no one hearing it. Their mouths yapped of their own situations, their own craziness, and their own frustrations. No one had asked my opinion. I had not offered it. I had just digested every one else’s story.

  What do you do? You put all the pieces together into a form that all can understand. But, when you do, will they really listen? Or will their own pain buzz around in their ears making them deaf, useless to each other?

  I lost it. Fear that is. Confidence had beaten it down finally after months of sideline viewing, years of closed-mouth head shaking, a career of being the diplomat, the shadow. It was time to take the reigns.

  Disease has a funny way of brightly coloring the world I live. The shades of gray seem to turn either black or white. Words aren’t minced, but rolled out like dice; the stakes always high – win or lose. There is no middle ground if you are really living to the fullest. There is no doing a thing halfway or sort of.

  You put on your armor of confidence and arm yourself with courage and knowledge, then run ahead full steam. If you don’t succeed – then you fail. So what. What is wrong with failure? Fear of failure makes us hesitant, cautious. It makes us bicker and gripe incessantly. If forces us to see only the negative.

  Fear is contagious. Once it is planted in one, it can overrun the most positive person sapping them of their energy, their resources, and their love of teamwork. Suddenly, fear makes us want to regress into our shells and it is all about ‘me’. I can only pity those who are strangled by fear. I have been there before and it can blind you. You are totally oblivious to its poison. You get caught up in a circle, never listening, only finger-pointing as you drown in negativity – the cowards drink.

  Something clicked. I got it. I became incredibly motivated to share it – to make it as contagious as fear. It is the word ‘team’. Suddenly I knew my perspective was grand. I got what the others couldn’t see. I had to share it, to make it spread. But optimism and teamwork aren’t individually rewarding at a glance, so I knew that it would be an uphill battle. The glitz of individualism was more enticing.

  The true reward comes from the feelings of accomplishment in a concerted effort. If you’ve never worked together and shared the glory, you can’t know the feeling. When it’s all about ‘me’, the ‘me’s suffer the most. When we fail to change, to bend, to wear blinders, we all lose. With disease, you fail a lot. I know personally. But you dust your pride off and you eat some humble pie. It is when you fail that you find the floor. It is only then that you are forced to look up.

  Could I make them see? I had all the pieces, a plan, and a burning desire to bend their ears, enlighten their hearts. You can’t change people, but you can influence them, motivate them, make them see something differently.

  It is up to the person that receives the knowledge to do with it what they will. Some will throw it in their emotion trash cans, not truly absorbing or understanding the message. Others will take a long look in the mirror. Personally, the look in the mirror isn’t bad. I’ve taken many a lengthy gaze at how to deal with my life.

  There is something heavy pulling me into another gear. My engine is revved and I am ready to hold out my arms to all who want to ride along side. Each brings some unique piece to the puzzle. Can I help them put the puzzle together? It takes every piece.

  So here is the challenge. It is ‘we’ versus ‘me’.

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