Jim and John Harbaugh's explosive sideline moments at the Super Bowl spark a question: can you be intensely passionate in high-stakes work without losing dignity? The speaker, who's been there as a player and coach, argues for a better way.
Good morning, everyone. Here is your Moment of Yes. I am still recovering from the Super Bowl excitement last night. There's 2 images that really stick out in my mind from last night's game, and unfortunately they both happen to be of the 2 Harbaugh coaches. The first one, Jim, at the end of the game where it looks like his player might have been held, kind of going nuts, going crazy, kind of losing it on the sidelines to the official. Which, if you watched a lot of football, you've seen actually Jim Harbaugh do that quite a bit. The second one was during the power outage when John Harbaugh, which you actually usually see as being more calm and collected, going crazy on— it looks like maybe an NFL league official, someone to do with the power outage, and just kind of ripping him up and down the other— The other side. Wasn't tough to lip read that one. So the idea that came to me was, here's these 2 brilliant coaches performing at the height of their profession, and yet an acceptable part of their profession is this over-the-top intimidation, anger, yelling, just this really undignified way of behaving. And whether it's professional sports or whatnot, We have almost kind of accepted that as being a part of the game. And we actually even lump it under the idea or the quality of intensity. Oh, he's just super intense. I think we're doing an injustice to the word intensity when we give people a free pass for acting a certain way and just saying, well, they really love, they're passionate, they're intense about what they do. Is it possible that we have that sort of intensity and passion about something without having to be undignified and disrespectful and uncompassionate to someone in the process. Yes, I know it's a high-stakes profession, but does that make it okay? Does that make it alright? And I don't mean to beat up on the 2 Harbaughs because growing up in sports, being a player, being a coach, I have caught myself in glimpses of that kind of intensity or anger or frustration, it's not something I'm typically proud about after the fact. And so is there a way for, for us to, to be so involved, passionate, and intense about what we're doing, yet still maintain a sense of dignity for those around us? That's my question to you today. Again, have a ton of compassion for yourself if you've ever experienced that. I know I have. And so what is that calling forth for us to do? Is there a higher expression of what we're capable of? That's what I'm thinking about this morning. That's your moment of yes. Have a great day. Bye.
