Adjustments
The past few weeks have been nothing short of heavenly in the Robinson realm. Why you ask? The National Basketball Association Playoffs! LOL. As regular readers of this blog know, I enjoy all sports, but particularly football and especially basketball.
As I often must remind folks, I am not a fan of any particular team or player. I am student of success and strategy, and professional sports offers a wealth of insight in both areas. I thoroughly enjoy playoff basketball because the level of intensity is heightened, the coaches and players are at their best., and the best players play even better. Watching the games is immensely entertaining.
But it isn’t just the games that I enjoy. I probably enjoy the post game commentary even more, particularly when the commentator is a former player and/or coach. Former players and coaches see the game with different eyes, and they usually offer unparalleled insight into how current coaches and players approach the game.
One of the terms that you will often hear former players and coaches bandy about in their post-game analyses is the term “adjustments.” To make an adjustment is to “bring something into conformity with external requirements.” It means to change because what you are doing is not working. In game parlance, an adjustment is shift in strategy primarily based on the score. After halftime, between quarters and sometimes during timeouts, a coach will make an adjustment. The coach may switch players, use a different defensive or offensive scheme, and even bench a superstar. The Legendary coach Mike Krzyzewski (the winningest coach in College Basketball) once stated “I have a plan of action, but the game is a game of adjustments.” All coaches go into a game with a well -thought out plan of attack. However, in order to win, they must usually adjust their strategy. That is why coaches are paid as much as they are. Their job is study the best way to win, and to make adjustments when it appears that there may be a better way. Games rarely turn out the way you plan, so adjustments are always necessary. A coach who cannot or will not make adjustments usually doesn’t win.
Adjustments are not only necessary in sports. They are also usually necessary in life. Life rarely turns out the way that we expect. The old proverb says that “man plans, but God laughs.” That proverb is a recognition that our lives don’t always go according to plan. A long time member of our church often says that “things are going according to plan, but it just ain’t your plan.” LOL. To be successful, we must all learn how to make adjustments. Adjustments are often necessary because what we are doing is not working.
The scripture shares a powerful story about a man named Zacchaeus who had a burning desire to see Jesus. However, he was physically short and the crowd surrounding Jesus was immense. But instead of allowing these challenges to derail his aspiration, Zacchaeus made an adjustment. According to Luke 19:4,
So he ran on ahead [of the crowd] and climbed up in a sycamore tree in order to see Him, for He was about to pass through that way.
Zacchaeus knew that his current strategy ( standing on the ground as just another face in the crowd) and his current limitations (his size and the size of the crowd) would not result the outcome he desired (to see Jesus). His plan of attack wasn’t working. So he made an adjustment. Consequently, he not only saw Jesus, but Jesus saw him, and made a visit to his house.
Question: What isn’t working in your life? Perhaps an adjustment is required.
Most of the adjustments we need to make in our lives are in 3 areas:
Adjustments to Our Attitude
Adjustments To Our Expectations
Adjustment to Our Perspective
So much of our disappointment in life boils down to a failure to adjust our attitude, expectations, and perspectives to the external requirements of the environments that we function in. We tend to resist making adjustments because for at least two reasons. However, Zaccheaus was able to overcome both.
It is difficult for us to admit that what we are doing isn’t working. When you invest a lot of time, energy and resources into a particular outcome and it does not yield results, we have a tendency to blame everything and everyone except ourselves. However, Zaccheus accepted the fact that he was short and the crowd wasn’t going anywhere. I guess he figured he had been short his entire life, and he wasn’t going to grow ten inches in enough time to see Jesuse!
Sometime an adjustment can feel like a compromise. But an adjustment is only a compromise if our principles or values are at stake. However, Zaccheaus didn’t break any laws by climbing that tree LOL. I am sure that climbing that tree was not in his game plan that day. But he understood that sometimes you gotta make adjustments.
To succeed in life, there are a few trees you are going to have climb that weren’t in your game plan.
But climb the tree.
And get the blessing.