Point to Ponder: You Gotta Have Grit If You Gonna Survive in this World of Peril and Strife

You gotta have grit if you gonna survive in this world of peril and strife. This world aint taking no prisoners, and no child will be left behind. In this day and age, as my son says, “it’s survival of the fittest, and only the strong will survive.” Well, I’ve often attributed the phrase “and a little child shall lead them to this, my golden child, and he has never given me reason to doubt otherwise. The twins are world-class leaders, but Jev is a people changer. Like his mother, he affects the world by touching one person at a time. The twins are in their best element when they command a crowd all looking in their direction, like in their chess tournaments – especially the one wherein CIS166X, Bronx, was called – yes, called – to compete in the high school nationals, even though it is “only an intermediate school from the south Bronx.”

Well, as fate would have it, the CIS166X Poison Pawns Chess Champions went to the High School Nationals in Chicago, Illinois, and won the biggest trophy I have ever seen – up close and personal. It stayed in our little apartment on Gerard Avenue for about a week. Then it was given over to the school for their trophy case, “because every great team captain returns the championship trophy to the school, so they could have it for their collection as an inspiration to other kids.” It was such an accomplishment on all our parts that I practically cried when they took it out of the house. The irony of it all is that the team left the tournament before it was over, because they only had a weekend pass, so they didn’t know that they had won. The trophy was presented to them at their graduation ceremony, in front of all their peers, relatives, friends and well-wishers, and for the rest of the day, the Poison Pawns reigned supreme. Everybody wanted to take pictures with them – thanks to that 4-1/2 foot gargantuan of a trophy.

The Poison Pawns won because they had grit. They won because they had the balls to tackle the thing that many thought couldn’t be done, and they did it.

Please forgive me, but I’m not one of those people who would kiss the booboo and make it better or put a bandage on the cut and wait for it to heal. I’m one of those people who would say, “If not now when?” I’m the kind of person who would be willing to rub pepper in a wound and cringe through the moment if I believed that it would take away the pain quicker, rather than sit back and wait for the cut to heal. I’ve got a let’s do it attitude and wait and see what happens is foreign to my personality, and I don’t get hung up on formality. That’s the real problem with putting bandages on sad situations; they make for a great cover-up, but they do nothing to alleviate the problem or help the situation.

Granted there are some pains where there are no visible cuts to be healed, but pain lingers on. That pain is there only as a grim reminder that there is something of greater significance to your present needs that justify the pain, like the pain of childbirth. In such instances, we have to learn how to press pass the pain for the greater gain, because as Paul so aptly put it “the sufferings of today will not compare to the joys of tomorrow.”

When I sat at my computer this morning, I had a whole different agenda in mind than the one that I just completed. This one came at me straight out of left field.

try as you might, there are some things that have to be experienced to be understood.” That’s the epitome of life.

You gotta have grit if you gonna succeed in this world that takes no prisoners and leave no child behind. No one is left unscathed by the perils of this world. Even Christ Jesus was caught in the snares of the enemy and was brought into condemnation, so who on God’s green earth do we think we are that we’d come, live, succeed, and die without adversity? Oh, you gotta be real about this. You can’t bury your head in the sand, leave your butt exposed to the world, and think somebody isn’t gonna be bold enough to kick you in the hiney, because sure as the day is long, someone will. So, if you don’t want to be a victim, then do whatever it takes to become the VICTOR – and for the most part, the only way to do that is to fight the good fight of faith and freedom, forgetting that which is behind and pressing onward to that which lies ahead.

God didn’t put you on this earth to complain about anybody’s else’s weakness. He put you on this earth to be “strong and very courageous.” So what exactly did you think those words were scripted for, breaking your bread with your bare hands and eating your chicken from the bone? I don’t think so. They are in the Word for a purpose, and that purpose is to tell you that adversity will always be a part of your life. In fact, adversity is the very essence of your existence, and you have to face it before you could overcome it. You gotta step up to the plate in the arena the game is played, and hit the ball that’s tossed to you. There is no presumption of winning out there. You can’t claim the score until you hit the ball. Your strife is to become women of excellence and mighty men of valor, and like Jev said, “it’s survival of the fittest, and only the strong will survive.” So if you’re not gonna hit the ball, then don’t get on the playing field, because you gotta hit the ball if you want to score – and You Gotta Have Grit If You Gonna Survive in this World of Peril and Strife.

© dem (07/30/2005)