What to do when I'm completely depleted of energy? This is the day to serve his blood gas with Anthony Engini. I recall this final day of the 40th year international convention of this association I was heading when I was much younger. I was so exhausted.
I don't even remember what I said in my closing speech. I mean, I was just not just actually exhausted. I was also so frustrated seeing so much divisions, seeing the discrimination. at the global level, right, of countries and of economies.
More than I can explain right now, but it was just so tough. I couldn't get a hold of myself. And that lasted for, I don't know how long. Eventually I recovered and when you ask me now, what is it that helped me recover from such a difficult experience, such an exhausting, depleting experience?
You know what I recall? It's just a couple of days of rest in Luxembourg, the entire team, the international team, we held office in Belgium and we took a number of days, more than just a couple, in Luxembourg just to rest, to play, to fish, right, and to roll down the grassy hills on a rainy day, just like we did when we were kids. Sometimes resting, in the case of Elijah, eating and sleeping is the most spiritual thing that you can do. Just think about that.
That's why perhaps it's called rest and recreation. Rest and re-creation because you need to re-create your cell once again. The past year and a half, there's also this revelation, something I just, it was just an idea that hit me, that there's so much energy in being patient in our own homes where the family members were locked in perhaps in our office situations where you clearly see the disconnect because of the lack of face-to-face, engagement, and so patience has been stretched. But what did I realize that enough of focusing on patience alone because that's holding back instead, why not redirect to passion?
Because that's not holding it back, that's pouring it out. And so it's not one or the other, but it's a combination that I think has kept me alive and my family too and my team members as well, these past months, over a year and a half by now, right? Because people not only held back but they poured into their hobbies, their families, their friends, their deepest relationships, their core values, there was a lot and is still ongoing, reflection, the sessions and activities and sharing meetings among my staff. And in this family, a lot of just listening to each other, share what's in our hearts.
It's not just holding back through patience, it's pouring out through passion. Don't ask yourself what the world needs. I've said this here before, instead ask yourself what makes it come alive because what the world needs is a person who's come alive, Howard Thurman. See, the will to fight, when I'm completely depleted, the will to fight depends on my appetite.
Seriously, when Benjamin won the iron kids gold medal in triathlon and he did that a number of times, when he was asked by reporters what motivated him and said it was the food my dad promised me at the end of the race, what motivated him to fight was his appetite, but literally in this case food. What is in your appetite? I also think that doing what you got to do because you got to do it, should be seen as an accomplishment in itself, right? I mean, there are days you just got to do what you got to do.
I mean, call a buddy for help, right? Negotiate a final deadline and just do a bit of what has to be done for the day. Ask for prayers, but you know, if you do what you just got to do, tap yourself in the shoulders because showing up is so important and is a victory in itself. I think tomorrow, to be honest with you, will be a tough day for running.
But all the more reason to do so, in good days I run in bad days, I've learned to run harder. Brene Brown, what did she say? The willingness to show up changes us. It makes us a little braver each time.
And let me quote with a final statement from Ralph Morrison. You've done it before and you can do it now. See the positive possibilities. Redirect the substantial energy of your frustration and turn it into positive, effective, unstoppable determination.