There are times during an athletic competition, consulting project, or eventful moment of life that I wonder how much longer I can maintain the pace.  It struck me the other day that it is during these moments that life it revealed at its fullest.  It is in the instant that you launch off the diving board and head for the pool water below.  You are committed and can either execute the dive you planned or perform a painful belly flop.  Put a number on your shirt and enter a running race and there will be a threshold that you reach where you have to decide if you can keep going or need to back-off.  There is no right answer but living in that moment of questioning for just a few seconds or minutes longer seems to reveal more than a lifetime of dreaming.  

The successes I most treasure are rooted in persevering when the questioning became most intense.  “Can I keep this up?  Will it be more painful a mile from now?  Do I have the stamina to sustain this effort?  What if a competitor pushes the pace faster, how will I match their acceleration?”


What are your questions?  How have they inspired you?  What lessons have you learned?