What Are You Hiding From?
February 03, 2012So……this Sunday is the Super Bowl!!! The game will be watched by more people than ever before. Madonna is performing at the halftime show. (I have so much to say about that but because this is a work-related blog I’ll decline to comment…for now). The whole sports world (and many people who don’t like football but are invited to parties or want to simply watch the commercials) will stop for 3-4 hours on Sunday as the NFL crowns a new champion.
While that’s going on publicly, behind the scenes there may be a player or 2 during the game who sustains a head injury. Recently, this article and others have publicly talked about something that has long been a hidden thing in the sports world: concussions and their potential long term impact. Currently, there are several lawsuits in the early stages and they are being started by former NFL players who are claiming long term damage from head injuries sustained during their playing days. The league is constantly trying to improve player safety and every year new rules and new equipment help to make progress toward making the sport safer. But still, players hide their injuries from teammates, coaches, and doctors.
That doesn’t surprise me. I played sports at the collegiate level and there were times that I probably shouldn’t have been on the field because of a head injury. (Feel free to make comments about how that’s impacted my writing or my thought process; my friends often do…) The expression “I got my bell rung” was pretty common then; only later did we realize that it meant we had most likely sustained a concussion.
But we didn’t want to leave the field and let our teammates down. I can’t imagine how much more motivated to stay on the field I would have felt if I were getting paid to play. I totally understand why players hide their injuries but it still doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do. Go ahead, point out my hypocrisy…
The concept of hiding things came up in a conversation I had recently with an employee of a big company. He had called our financial helpline to talk about his financial situation. He spends more than he makes each paycheck, he funds the excess with credit cards, and now he is getting phone calls from bill collectors on a regular basis. How does he handle all of this right now? He hides from it! He doesn’t log in to his bank’s website to check his balances. He throws credit card statements in the trash because he doesn’t want to see the balances and the late fees. He doesn’t answer his phone unless he recognizes the number so that he doesn’t have to talk to the collections agencies. He is in full fledged denial. He is hiding from his financial life the way that I hid from concussions in college & the way many NFL players do today. Guess what? Here’s a news flash: hiding from it doesn’t make it better!!!
I don’t care if it’s a concussion, your debt situation, or your medical situation (my mother is terrified to see a doctor because she’s afraid of what they might find so she typically cancels 3 or 4 appointments before finally going in), the first thing you can do in order to make an improvement in your quality of life is to face the situation honestly. Hiding from things is a product of fear and doubt. The person who was throwing away his credit card statements was afraid of what the statements said. He had significant doubt about how and where to start to change his situation.
During our conversation, we broke through the fear and doubt and he promised to himself that he would no longer hide from his financial life. He decided to make a change. It started with the man in the mirror. (Thank you, Michael Jackson!) His first step is to organize his financial life using a simple Debt Inventory or Financial Organizer. Once he is able to look in the mirror, tell himself he’s done hiding, and put together some basic facts about where he stands financially, we can take the next steps toward making progress. The first step is deciding that changing your situation is important and worth pursuing! I’m talking with him again shortly and I’ll let you know what his “next steps” are.