The huge crowd booed the man in the arena, booed him lustily. Truth is, he was stinking up the place; his performance, if you could even call it that, was pitiful and personally humiliating. The guy was physically overmatched. He was weak and emasculated. He didn’t belong out there, was way out of his league, so far out of his league that he couldn’t have reached it with a cannon shot. And so the people who were gathered—who had come hoping for and expecting an exciting, closely contested tilt–booed long and loud.
The man in the arena heard the booing, knew the crowd was disappointed in his performance. But even as he absorbed a brutal blow to the body and subsequently stumbled backwards with blood streaming out of his nose, contentment reigned within his heart. There was nothing more he could do; he was already doing his best. The other man was just better than him today. Quite frankly, the other man would always be better than him in this particular athletic pursuit. But that didn’t make him a better man. That didn’t make him superior as a person. The man in the arena knew this. The crowd did not.
The man in the arena took yet another ferocious blow, this time to the head, and began tumbling backwards off his feet. The crowd stood as one and cheered crazily as the contest moved near to its obvious and foregone conclusion. The man in the arena smiled inscrutably as he hit the deck with a resounding thud, knowing that he had given his all and done his utmost.
He was at peace with himself.
The crowd?
They had done nothing, attempted nothing, nor would they ever attempt anything of substance for the entirety of their lives. These people lived their lives vicariously. They were kingmakers, creating heroes as well as villains, but, ironically, not one of them possessed the requisite courage to ever darken the entrance to the arena him/herself. They loved to watch other people try and oftentimes not succeed, yet an acute fear of failure paralyzed these individuals into a permanent state of lethargy. They would never take that crucial first step and try anything challenging, because with trying comes the possibility–however miniscule–of failing. And these lifelong spectators could not deal with failure, couldn’t deal with it at all; to them it was toxic and a thing to be avoided at all costs. Their psyches were much too fragile and their self-esteem too shallow and fleeting to handle aborted endeavors; a result had to be guaranteed well in advance in order for them to cautiously proceed.
The huge crowd of people assembled for this week’s martial arts event was one big glob of maggots, a conglomeration of blood-sucking parasites, a potpourri of amorphous slime. They were not to be counted…..they were nothing.
Fred's Soapbox 