They haven’t yet built a filter that makes lazy look like the calloused hands of a future champion. They haven’t yet built a filter that turns the empty talk of “wants” and “will be’s,” of “will have’s” and “should be’s,” into the quiet walk of “have dones” and “will do agains”. They haven’t yet built a filter that paints the sky the colour of the kind of fire that only burns deep inside and late at night. The kind of fire that can’t be extinguished or diminished by anything but a full throttle, full-body, full-throated front assault on our own potential. They haven’t yet built a filter that transforms a selfie into self-confidence.
The way only progress after failure, after failure, after soul-shaping failure, as the pain erasing power to do it. They haven’t yet built a filter that echoes louder than the snake oil salesman whispering resistance in the tall grass of our caveman minds. They haven’t yet built a filter that converts inspiration into action; action into resiliance; that transmogrifies resiliance into trust, and trust into patience; and patience into victories. Patience can’t be downloaded. Can’t be photo-shopped and cropped into existence. Can’t be sold, borrowed, shared, hurried or happened upon along the news feed of least resistance. Patience can’t be faked, like a smile. They haven’t yet built a filter that gets the alchemy of victory quite right. When most of us are dropping unmeasured drips of ambition and ego and pride into the beaker of our days. When most of us are dripping unmeasured drops of hope and luck and fear beneath the microscope of our gaze.
The calloused hands of the future champion know to measure and mix two parts patience for every one part hustle. She knows patience without hustle is procrastination. And hustle without patience is merely masturbation. He knows patience is the second language learned mostly through immersion. He knows patience is a bushwhacked excursion through the thickets of a lived life. He knows patience isn’t a wild moment that can be captured like a photograph; can be tamed like a line of code; can be bought and sold like a smart phone. They haven’t yet built a filter that makes time under tension so sexy it grabs our attention. That makes patience look pristine. That makes the podium seem surperfluous, to the dream.
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