Sports as a Metaphor for life Part 1: Hockey
Like life, hockey is messy and complicated
Life isn’t linear. Instead, it snakes around corners of heartache, pain, and suffering, and requires ultimate endurance and perseverance.
Kinda like hockey. The Stanley Cup playoffs started this week and I implore you to watch if you never have and start NOW (ESPN or TNT, almost every night).
Patrick Swayze’s words in Point Break say it all: “100%, pure adrenaline.”
In addition to being fun, Hockey’s like life: brutal and exhilarating. Watch it, learn from it, appreciate it.
Here are six ways hockey is a metaphor for life:
- Life requires multi-tasking
No need for an explanation here. Hockey requires you to do two things at once: skate and handle the puck. Try doing one. You’ll probably eat some ice.
2. Life is a mess and a grind
Nobody in this life can escape grinding like hell. The road to success isn’t pretty. I’ve had plenty of suck in my life.
Hockey goals aren’t pretty. Most of the time goals are scored by hacking and whacking at the puck, shooting blindly towards the goal, hoping it will go off of a skate or stick in mid-air and go in. No goal is easy. Always earned and not pretty.
3. Make your time count
In most sports, the best players are on the court or field the majority of the game. Not hockey. Due to the physical exertion, even the best players only play 40–60 seconds per shift and 20 minutes per game (there are three periods of 20 minutes each).
Most of life is just hangin’ out, “killing time” as Jerry Seinfeld puts it. You never know how long you’ll live — make your shift in this life count.
4. Life requires you to keep your head on a swivel
Every day, we get hit from all sides out of the blue. You can’t look at your feet and expect anything good to happen. You have to be able to see multiple things at the same time.
In hockey, players have to keep their heads on a swivel. Looking one way for too long and a blindside hit is coming, sometimes with major repercussions.
5. Good things can happen out of desperation
Massive life-change for the good can come out of desperation. Here’s the key though — you have to figure out where that desperation is coming from and pause. Give it a minute. It’s easy to make major mistakes when you’re desperate. Quit a job, leave a relationship, and fly off the handle. Just chill.
Desperation can be a sign from God that something needs to change. The changes can be simple. If you’re sick of your job, look for a different role at your company. Good managers know employees get bored. Or craft a plan and start something else. It’s a process. I hate it. I want it NOW. This has caused major problems in my life.
The last two minutes of a hockey game are pure desperation. There is nothing like it in sports. It’s pure theatre. It’s a mad dash to the finish.
Pucks fly everywhere, it’s like target practice, absolute desperation time. Also, pay attention to the announcers. This is where the greats make it fun.
John Forslund is one of the all-time greats. His tone becomes auction-like: “Aho passes to Staal, Staal dumps it in on a cycle, it’s hack and whack baby, Crosby pitchforks it out of the zone.” The desperation can result in game-tying goals but it is “controlled desperation” that pays off.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHvE0cTSBrw
6. Life can end abruptly
Sorry to be morbid but it’s true, it happens every day. Car crashes, heart attacks. Like life, hockey overtime is “sudden death.” One mistake and it’s lights out.
When a road team wins in overtime it’s the equivalent of losing electricity for the home crowd. The sticks go up for the winning team and the crowd goes silent — 30,000 fans are hushed at once. It’s over.
Winning the Stanley Cup is the toughest trophy in all of sports. There are four rounds of playoffs, each best-of-seven. A team can potentially play 28 games.
Life is short so play your shift well and happy grinding.