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August 1, 2003/Av 3 5763, Vol. 55, No. 49
Winning life's races
BARRY COHEN
Editor
Lance Armstrong explains that the Tour de France, a race he astoundingly has won five consecutive times, poses every conceivable challenge: cold, heat, mountains, flat tires, high winds and crashes.
"During our lives we're faced with so many different elements as well, we experience so many setbacks, and fight such a hand-to-hand battle with failure, head down in the rain, just trying to stay upright and to have a little hope," he wrote in "It's Not About the Bike, My Journey Back to Life." (Berkley Pub Group, $13, paperback)
At these moments, when we are staring at illness, fear, pain, anger and anxiety, where do we turn?
We must look to our teammates, notes Armstrong.
When racing, we save energy on climbs by riding behind a teammate and drafting; downhill, we save energy by riding behind a teammate who cuts the wind resistance; we need a sprinter to chase down competitors who break from the pack and slow their pace by drafting behind them, he explains.
Jewish tradition as well teaches our need to depend upon our teammates.
When Moses descended Mount Sinai, carrying the tablets of the Ten Commandments, he found the children of Israel dancing around the Golden Calf. In desperation, he smashed the stone tablets.
One tradition teaches that Moses subsequently returned to the top of the mountain and remained with God, preparing a second set of the commandments. An alternate view teaches that Moses remained with the people - listening to their wants and needs, their fears and dreams. Together, they accomplished a communal tikkun, a healing.
When Lance Armstrong learned in 1996 that cancer had spread to his testicles, lungs and brain, he could have confronted the struggle alone.
Instead, he looked to his most personal teammates: his mother and his closest friends. He leaned on them and they supported him.
Reflecting on how he defeated the cancer, he writes, "illness was not unlike athletic performance ... in that there is so much we don't know about our human capacity."
In this way, when we face a physical illness or a spiritual crisis, we become athletes. We symbolically race our Tour de France. In order to finish strong, we cannot do it alone. We depend upon our teammates.
In doing so, we create opportunities to push beyond perceived limits. And if we have yet to surprise ourselves in the midst of crisis, that does not mean we won't when we face the next crisis. And as a teammate, we must fulfill our responsibility to reach out to those who depend upon us and provide comfort and support.
Pinchas of Koretz taught that the first step of any kind of healing is "to be concerned not only with yourself but with everything that goes on around you; help others and you will help yourself. You want to serve God? Start with serving God's children."
During times of crisis, by looking to others to allay our anxieties and sharing our strengths with those who need us, we will gain victory in the races we run through life.
Contact the writer at barry_cohen@jewishaz.com.
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