Fundamental Friday: Trust the process

Thank God it’s Fundamental Friday. This weekly article will venture into the fundamental elements of a variety of aspects of our lives and present the question to us all, “Are we fundamental sound?”

Trust: The fundamental word for this Friday.

Trust is a firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something. Note that this applies to someone or something. The concept of being trustworthy that can be applied to every aspect of our lives. This includes those in our lives and how we perceive them as well as how they perceive us.

Trust in ourselves is tied to our confidence. Confidence in ourselves is directly related to our successes in completing a task with the results we desired. Shooting free-throws in basketball is a great example of trusted oneself to make a free-throw. The process of teaching or learning how to shot a free-throw begins with how you hold the ball, feet spread apart shoulder width and knees slightly bent.

photo credit: Keith Allison Andre Iguodala via photopin (license)

Then the focus shift to how the ball is held, the actual shot and lastly, the follow through. As the technique of shooting free-throws is practice, an athlete becomes comfortable and eventually gains confidence in his ability to shoot free-throws.

Practice does not make perfect, but practicing properly can lead to confidence that helps athletes gain confidence, or shall we shall say trust, in one’s ability to shoot free-throws. The key in getting better is the athlete has to trust in his ability that comes with being successful shooting free-throws. This confidence building that leads to us trusting ourselves is applicable to life and faith.

In life, the challenges we face daily can be minimized or lessened when building confidence and trust in our abilities. It requires understanding each situation we are faced with and what areas we can train in or practice that will allow us to gain trust in ourselves and our ability to complete each task with a desirable outcome. Trusting in our abilities to complete a task is a fundamental element that we can improve as we gain confidence.

In our faith in God, the practice is for us to practice relying on God. Especially in the midst of trials, tribulation or other situations that may be uncomfortable or difficult. As we put more trust in God, we allow our trust in ourselves as it relate to God and his plans for us.

photo credit: proctoracademy IMG_8085 via photopin (license)

Our trusting in ourselves and our abilities begins and ends with us. It has nothing to do with what others think. In fact, for those nay-sayers, that should be motivational fuel to help us work more diligently to build our confidence. Trusting in ourselves is only one-third of the fundamental element. The second of these three parts of trust is trusting others.

As we get older and mature through life experience and the typical education afforded to us, we can began to develop an arrogance and lack of trust in those that have been in our lives such as our parents, mentors and coaches.
As children, we initially depend on our parents which leads to an unyielding trust. The love our parents have for us generally helps us develop a trust that is demonstrated daily.

Somehow we reach teenage years and begin to think we know more than our parents. As parents, we recognized this transition because we too at one point thought we knew more than I parents. What is interesting is that when we are honest with ourselves, the lesson that our parents attempted to teach us during the “I know more than my parents” stage generally ends up proving to us that our parents do know what they are talking about.

Teachers are or should be an extension of our parents. The issue with acknowledging teachers in this manner is teachers have up to 35 children in their class. Even if we have siblings, we don’t have 30 plus individuals competing for attention. That’s potentially 30 plus different attitudes that teachers have to contend with. To get all that a teacher has to offer us, we must acknowledge the environment we are in and trust in the teacher’s knowledge juxtapose challenging them when we don’t completely understand.

photo credit: Georgia Southern University One-on-One Student-Teacher Interaction via photopin (license)

Coaches and mentors seemingly follow this same path. As we coach and/or be coached, as we mentor or be mentored, the focus has to be on building a trusting relationship in which the coach/mentor is trusted and the athlete/student is trusting. Trusting in those who have dedicated their lives to coach/mentor is essential in improving and mature in specific sports and subject matters.

Trusting others, especially those whom we know loves us and/or cares enough about us that they spend the most precious item we have with us. The precious item is time. If a person is spending time and energy to help us be a better person, student or athlete then the least we can do is trust them as they attempt to elevate us to a higher level.

Trusting the process is the last of these three fundamental elements. The process generally does not reveal the results we want right away or quick enough. When teaching an athlete how to hit a baseball, the process does not have batters hitting home runs right away. As a matter of fact, the process will have less mature batters hitting ground balls.

But if the athlete trust the process, they will be soon hitting line drives and eventually home runs. This only happens when there is trust in the process. In life, there is an abundance of processes that await us. These processes vary and can often times be too long and lead to frustration. In trusting any process, we must take the time to adequately understand the process.

photo credit: Brook-Ward Tom Brady & Josh McDaniels via photopin (license)

Lack of understanding of a process can a lead to frustration and not ever obtaining what we seek or desired. Once we understand the process, then we can effectively assess ourselves as we venture into any process that will keep us on the road to a desirable end. This does not mean that the process will be any quicker and longer than another person. What it means is that we all learn differently and at different paces.

Sometimes the process will require us to wait on those that require addition time, training or coaching. This is when patience is required. It has been stated that “patience is a virtue.” This is true when we taking about trust as a fundamental element. The phrase I think is imperative to help us work through any process is: “Patience is a virtue, but persistence is a must.”

As we exercise patience and perseverance, let’s remain true to the process. To stay true to the process, we must know the process and respect the processes. Fundamentally, we have to incorporate trust in every aspect of our lives. This element has three parts in which the first, most important, is trusting in ourselves. The second is trusting in others.

Lastly, we have to trust the process. As we build our trust in these area, our confidence will increase and the obtaining any desirable outcome becomes easier…Not easy, but easier. Until next time, remember to stay fundamental sound and trust yourself, your parents and teachers, and lastly trust the process.


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