May 17, 2021 - Confidence Leads To Being Calm and Ready

When teaching/coaching basketball, one of the key areas is ballhandling. It is vitally important to teach a player the value of each possession… that the ball is “gold.” Therefore, when I am teaching ballhandling, I not only do the traditional drills, but I also put players in adverse positions/situations to be more realistic to the game… the ball does not always bounce straight! I have them 

Basically, I want players with the great ballhandling skills… I love to see the ability to go between the legs and behind the back… the do great “Maravich Dribble” crossovers… etc. BUT I also am adamant about not over-dribbling… being under control… calm… knowing the ability is there when needed!

The negative of having great skills is the natural desire to show them off. I can remember many times as a coach, where a player on the opposing team was demonstrating his impressive ballhandling ability, and I would yell to my player that was guarding him, “Let him dance!”

The opposing player did have high ability but not high basketball IQ. The player failed to understand that the purpose of skills is to help one get to the goal… and that use of those skills when not needed is wasted movement and risky… (since a higher degree of difficulty creates a higher percentage of mistakes.)

Obviously, I am not teaching basketball in this blog… BUT the reality is that our human pride drives us in every area of life to want to “show off” a bit with our mental “skills.” And in our “goal” in Christianity to share the Gospel with others, we at times spend too much time sharing our wealth of knowledge while the world is just sitting back letting us “dance.” Our knowledge/words should be used to create openings to the “goal!” This leads to confidence and living under control… being calm and ready!

The Proverbs have some cool stuff to say about this… in chapter 17:

27 He who restrains his words has knowledge (wisdom), And he who has a cool spirit is a man of understanding. 28 Even a fool, when he keeps silent is considered wise; when he closes his lips, he is considered prudent. (NASB)

Here’s how Eugene Peterson put it in The Message:

27 The one who knows much says little; an understanding person remains calm.