I was in my early thirties, when I had an inner-ear problem that landed me in the hospital for an overnight stay. Before I was discharged, Dr. Cash told me to see a cardiologist as soon as possible. My heart rate had dropped to below 30 beats per minute during the night and he thought I needed a pace-maker. Being a normal male homo sapien, I told him “okay” with no plans to ever fill that prescription. I felt fine and believed the hospital’s machines must have been broken.
Everything went along quite well until Dr. Cash made a call to our home. Being the dad of a pre-school child, I figured staying around a while longer was important, so I scheduled an appointment with the head of cardiology at the University of Tennessee in Memphis. I arrived on time for my appointment, but was not prepared to take a stress test; therefore, I took it in my socked feet. After several minutes on the dreaded treadmill, and hearing the doctor and technicians talk about my heart rate going up and then falling sharply, I was ready for a rest. I had been instructed that if I had intense pain to let them know and the test would end immediately. Finally I had taken all I could, so I told them, “Stop, I am truly hurting!”
Immediately, I was laid on my back and stethoscopes flew into action, checking my chest, back, arms, legs, and even my neck. After what I felt was a long investigative procedure, the doctor asked me where I felt pain. “It’s the bottom of my feet, Doctor!” When my bloodied socks were removed, blisters that had busted were noted. That was my only encounter with a treadmill test!
Three days later, I returned to Memphis to see the cardiologist and get the results of my torturous medical procedure. He began by asking me about my childhood. Where did I live? Where did I attend school? What did I do at home and in school? When I mentioned that I lived on a small farm in Oklahoma and ran track for the Catossa Indians, his interest was peaked. How old was I when I ran track and what was my speciality? I proudly reported that I was the only student in the 8th grade that could break a five-minute mile. I continued boasting that I often went to track meets in which I had no competition, because few boys ran the mile in that part of the nation.
Finally, the diagnosis came – I had an “athletes heart”. He told me that because of my training, my heart was stronger than normal, rested better than normal, and although my body would wear out, my heart would remain beating! That was good news then, but now, at my age, I am not sure I want my heart to outlive the rest of me!
The way I got running the mile was that I was about the slowest sprinter in our school. I played other sports but most of the time I came in last or next to last when we ran. Trying to improve my running, Coach Cagle told me to try running with my work boots on over plowed ground. I liked it! Later he would suggest that I run with my coat on and carry the heaviest items that would fit in my pocket. I liked it! I wanted to excel at something in sports, and it seemed that I may have found my place. I could run – never faster – but farther than other kids.
There are many lessons that I have learned over the years as I reflect on my achievements. 1. The only way to successfully run the big race is to train hard for lesser distances. 2. Tackle little problems with diligence. 3. Expect a little pain along the way because training is always hard work. 4. Never complain about what others can do better than you, but seek one area where you might excel and work hard at it. 5. Train hard over the short haul because you are conditioning yourself for greater victories in the long race of life.
Take the measure of the problem you are now facing. Is it a giant or is it little things that are ganging up on you? If you do not know which it is, you cannot prepare to defeat it. When facing a giant, you need to prepare your “big guns”. But, when you are seeing little things ganging up on you, you need your “shot gun”! The rifle will drop a single giant with only one piece of lead, but the little things will require a larger blast with many small pieces of lead being propelled forward toward the problem area.
We need to learn to win some small victories every day. Some days the battle will be as small as curbing one little appetite, but other days it will be as large as changing an attitude to a more appropriate one. It is in the small victories of life that we are preparing for big achievements.
Now that it has been decades since I have “run a block”, I have learned that it is not about “manpower” or “horsepower”, but it is about God’s power. When we submit ourselves to God and appropriate His daily strength, we will find winning a daily experience and losing will be thrown out of our vocabulary! All homo sapiens are fools who set out to run a marathon when they have not yet run a mile!
