Woodpeckers

I like disc golf. Well.. I love disc golf. Not that kind of brotherly love that navy seals have which is why they have each others' names tattooed on their butts (if you'd been through what they have been, you'd understand) or how you love your best friend's sister (which oddly enough also leads to tattoos on the posterior). I love disc golf like that creepy homeless guy loves red shirts and he attacked your best friend when he was going on his first date with this really cute girl but she was waiting outside and misjudged the scene and thought he was beating up the homeless guy so she left (I swear, not from personal experience).

Disc golf gives me a chance to do a lot of things I love doing... I can be competitive, I can get exercise, I can relieve stress (I get rewarded the harder I throw things, who needs anger management?) and most importantly to myself, I get to spend a large amount of time out in the beautiful creation of God called "Nature".

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy sitting inside cuddling up on a couch and watching a movie like any other in way over his head hopeless romantic, but I would enjoy camping probably more. I'm not the biggest fan of technology in general, no matter how easily it allows me to broadcast my opinions about things that generally irritate me.

Never the less, nature. One of my favorite things about nature is the orchestra of sounds going on that seem to give little attention to the people invading the nearby vicinities. The most apparent example for me today was a little woodpecker knocking about a tree while I was playing disc golf. There's something fascinating about something on a mission. When it's a man, it's empowering and encouraging. When it's a woman, it is quite possibly the most attractive thing (in my humble but clearly important opinion). When it's an animal, the ensuing scene can bring one of two feelings: enchantment or depression.

For some of us, we often become captured by the scene of the snail trying to climb up a tree and we begin to watch the little fellow begin his ascent, but as soon as he nears the true trunk of the tree, he falls. Once again tortured by his inability to scale this monstrous challenge. This gives us not only a sense of discouragement towards the snail (poor little fellow can't even climb a tree). We too often, like in our own lives, focus on all the challenges that seem completely unconquerable (most of which happen to be pointless anyway, like a snail climbing a tree. What are you thinking, little guy?!). I happened upon this woodpecker this morning and found myself enamored with his quest for whatever he was questing for. I am not the smartest man, so I could not begin to have the foggiest notion of why woodpeckers peck wood (or how much wood a woodpecker could peck). But whatever his ambition, whatever his goal, he was vehemently searching it out. Whatever was contained inside the bark of those trees was more important to him than the two disc golfers that happened to walk right beneath him, only 10 feet away from his position.

Wait... not only did this woodpecker have a mission, but he was also undisturbed by the larger creatures around him even within close proximity? Now I know me saying 10 feet seems like a far distance in terms of height, but distance is distance. Have you ever tried to chase a squirrel or a bird? Try and get within 10 feet. I'll give you a dollar if you can get within 10 feet and the animal is still 100% focused on whatever they are focused on. When the giants of our lives come traipsing through the woods towards us, how often do we continue on our mission? How focused are we to begin with? Does our ambition only take us until the point where we feel we might have to sink or swim or does it take us until the point where our task is completely accomplished, to the fullest extent that our wills can take us through the power of God?

Far more importantly, are we actually pulling apart the bark just to say we have accomplished it, or is there a purpose? I'm sure that woodpecker was searching for food or looking for a place to make its home. I'm most sure it was not tapping that tree when we came by to irritate us. And I'm 103.6% sure that it was not doing it to say "Hey! Look at how strong my neck muscles are. Look how hard I'm pecking!" In my head, the woodpecker has a Long Island accent much like a mobster.

What are you working on? What are you working towards? Are you even working?

Be fervent. Be focused. Be finished.

-Drew.