Clear Eyes, Full Hearts, Can’t Lose
Last year, after a lot of years spent in the love-induced, love-infused rabbit hole of baby and toddler parenting, I was finally able to return to streaming shows. I got to binge on a few series that passed me by. One of those series was the American football precursor to Ted Lasso, Friday Night Lights. Just like Coach Lasso has his wise sayings, Coach Taylor had his, the most famous of which was “Clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose!”
Though this saying was meant for the players on the field, like Lasso, Taylor was always really talking about the game of life. The gist of the saying was: see clearly, with loving eyes, and you’ll reach your dreams. And he meant it. Whether the immediate outcome was win or lose, with a full heart and clear perception of the process itself, learning and growing (as a player and as a human being) was happening. Win-win.
The first step was clearing away the internal demons that afflicted a player—the webwork of emotional scar tissue that would have a player see through eyes of fear and anger. Taylor wanted his players to play for the love of the game—the process of it all—and to play with their hearts full of humanity, fraternity, and passion and care for the team and the sport.
The second step was getting a player’s internal voice to become as supportive and loving as his own voice was. In other words, training the players to hear the “clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose” wisdom and to see from the coach’s supportive point of view without having the coach articulate it for the person in that moment. Training the player was a training in hearing—hearing the love and compassion within so that one could be driven by that above all else.
Hearing Love
As a parent and teacher, I identify with that goal. Contrary to what others (especially my newest incoming students) might think, my goal isn’t to force knowledge or skills onto others. My goal is to have them be able to think for themselves, with the full wisdom that I have gained through my own learning.
Before we can get down to the brass tacks of learning to read, as my kindergartners are doing, or learning to read scientific journal articles and collect data, as my scientists-in-training are doing, they need to have their eyes clear and their hearts full. They need to quash the hater voices and turn up the sound on the internal empathizer.
Every one of us has an internal narrative that runs in the background. We have patterned ways of talking to ourselves that so often are detrimental, not supportive…cutting us down as opposed to building us up. My goal as a parent and teacher, is to replace any hurtful voices in there with an uplifting one. I do this by teaching my own children to love themselves, to see their infinite potential, and to know that I’ll be there with them if they need me no matter what slip-ups or challenges unfold. I try to do this with my students too by teaching them to tap into their self-worth, to see that they have what it takes to become a scientist or whatever they want to be, and of course to relax into the process of learning that we are engaged in together no matter what roadblocks or detours come up along the way.
Retooling the internal narrative is the first step to learning new things. And it is not just becoming one’s internal coach that I am after, but rather one’s internal cheerleader and best friend.