When I was a kid – and people in their fifties will remember this – we all had a “superball”. It was a black ball, made of high-density rubber, very hard, a little bigger than a golf ball and with the particularity of bouncing much more than other balls of the time.
My buddies and I (we were ball players in those days) organized a sort of unofficial competition in which we would bounce the “superball” as high as possible. You should have seen us take off to throw the ball on the ground so that it would bounce as high as possible. Of course, the harder we threw it on the ground, the higher it bounced. Believe it or not, sometimes it bounced higher than the school’s three-storey wall. But still!
As I don’t usually write columns about bullets but about motivation, I’m getting to the point, but I’m sure you’ve already made the connection.
Each of us, at some or several times in our lives, encounter different obstacles. Loss of job, non-renewal of contract, serious illness, heartbreak, accident, etc., it happens to all of us at one time or another. When it happens, we feel completely discouraged, isolated and crushed by this event that we consider unfair, it is normal.
Allow me to make a suggestion. When you receive what they call a “good slap in the face”, why not turn this “unwanted” event into a “superball” event? I know it’s childish, but I recommend it anyway.
All I’m saying is that, even if things aren’t going well at the moment, you’ll always bounce back like a superball. It’s that simple! You need to have the reflex to “see” in your head that the harder you hit the ground, the higher you bounce, and that the bigger the backhand, the more energy it gives you to bounce back. You don’t know how or when it’s going to happen, but you’re going to bounce, that’s for sure.
Bouncing is one of the greatest principles of physics. In baseball, the harder and more accurately the batter hits the ball, the further it will go. It’s the same in golf, etc. Anything that is hit with force will bounce back with equal force.
If you’re going through a difficult situation right now, whatever it may be, imagine throwing a “superball” hard on the ground and watching it bounce dozens of meters into the air. That’s you in a few moments. You’re going to bounce so high and so hard that you won’t even remember what happened to you. It’s one of the laws of life, and there’s no way around it!
Good bounce!
Image source: superb work by Pierre Ardouvin, Pour mieux rebondir…, 1995.
Photo Pierre Ardouvin ©Pierre Ardouvin ADAGP
