Hearing Footsteps
Have you ever heard it said, “they were hearing footsteps”? Let me refresh your memory; perhaps it came from a sports announcer and was followed by a major blunder by a player. To the player “hearing footsteps” he lost sight of the ball and dropped the touchdown pass. To the player “hearing footsteps” he miss-timed his jump and the slam-dunk he consistently throws down in practice became a slam-thunk. Are you catching a trend? Perhaps a visual may do the trick.
To the swimmer “hearing footsteps” he loses sight of his goal, compromises his swimming stroke, and loses precious seconds in the race. Here we see, quite literally, what it means to “hear footsteps”. The swimmer farthest out is so preoccupied with what another is doing that he forgets what he is doing, swimming to the finish line! Now I am no expert in professional swimming technique but one thing I am certain, where you are aiming to swim to has got to be where you are facing and looking towards. By looking away, if even for a brief moment, this swimmer added precious seconds to his time by sacrificing his rhythm and form. And for what? To track another competitor along the way? What good is this when you are pushing towards your own goal and giving it all you have already?
This is just like the receiver in football who drops the ball with no one else around him or the basketball player who misses the wide-open layup. What is almost automatic to them is thrown off by a single moment of hesitation. The second of doubt becomes prophesy. It removes the player from the game and momentarily places them in their own head which subsequently throws off their action and allows the doubt to become a reality. The swimmer looking at the other’s lane in this picture does not beat that swimmer in the race. In fact, he not only loses his race to that swimmer, but he lets 3 more swimmers pass him on the way! This is what happens when we move through life looking at another’s lane.
Hearing Footsteps in Our Lives
While all these examples indicate the perils of worrying about others, I will proceed with the example of swimming as I believe it provides the clearest parallel to our lives. The photo above was taken at the height of Michael Phelps’ incredible Olympic journey. Unfortunately for the other swimmer, this photo went viral when it was released back in 2014. Imagine the attention he got when the whole world captured his blunder this way. I can only imagine how his friends teased him when he made the trip back home. It couldn’t have been easy for him in the wake of this photo. But let’s be honest, how many times throughout our life were we the far swimmer in this photo looking at another’s lane alongside our own? How many times just this day alone? The reality is we all “hear footsteps”. And while our lives may not be as highly profiled or charted as they are in professional sports, these blunders still have significant impact in our life and we too “drop” the wide open opportunities we are thrown.
Keeping in our own lane
When we turn our heads from our own journey and become affixed on somebody else’s we lose focus of our goals, our ambitions, our motivations, and even our morals all as a means of tracking our pace with the competition. The wake up call here is this does not help us in any way! No, it holds us back. Back from where we are meant to go. Where only we can. We each have our own lane in life. We can’t worry about others swimming their race. Unlike the photo above, our medal at the end is in no way related to the swimmers around us. Our race is held exclusively in our own lane. There are other fellow swimmers in the pool but what they’re doing does not impact our lane. They may splash us or send us waves from time to time, but the track will remain constant and the end goal stays the same. When we focus on others we lose sight of the one thing that keeps us moving towards our own goal and happiness–if our sight is not on it, then no one’s is on it.
Other’s will be at largely varying points in their journey. One sure way to lose progress in our own is to follow what they’re doing. They’re at a different point, and in a different race altogether. While there may be similarities there’s a plethora of difference. ‘The water, the waves, the conditions’: all of these are tailored to fit our own personal ‘lane’. The waves that hit us will never be more than we can handle, but they may be more than the swimmer next to us can handle. Just as much as we individuals vary, so too do our lanes in life. Keep in your own, and root on other ‘swimmers’ in their races too. Don’t let the sight of them cast doubts on what you’re doing. Trust yourself. You have what it takes. You can catch this ball, you can make this layup, and you can finish swimming your own race.