WHAT I LEARNT THROUGH SURGERY
Chaos to Control
Being unprepared.
And vulnerable.
Having gone through many surgeries,
I found myself in the pre-operation debrief with a realisation:
I am not prepared.
I had pushed it to the back of my mind.
Treated it like just another surgery.
That tactic didn’t work.
This time, it was my eyes.
Now it’s sink or swim.
I better get my shit together. Fast.
As I write this, it all seems easy.
It wasn’t.
I had found my edge.
And it’s damn uncomfortable.
I lie down for the set-up.
A cover placed over the top half of my body.
Only my right eye exposed.
My heart felt like it was going to burst through my chest.
My body tensed.
Screaming to get up and shout STOP!
Panic was setting in.
Yet.
My eye found the light above.
Blurry.
But a target all the same.
A focal point.
Breathing slows.
My body starts to calm.
Not gone, but shifting.
I’m fascinated by what’s happening.
Fear had shown up as clever as ever.
Yet, I was able to be with it., AND stay in the game.
Phewww…
Now onto the surgery.
My Mission:
Maintain my eye on the focal point above, no matter what.
So simple.
Focal point.
Breathe.
If I lose focus.
Recognise and refocus.
That’s it.
Seems too simple.
My right eye done.
Now rinse and repeat for my left.
New Mission.
Same process.
We go through the same set-up.
My body activates again.
This time it’s 10x more.
Stronger surge.
More tension.
More resistance.
My body reacting with more aggression.
I refocus back to.
Focal point.
Breath.
My body starts to calm.
Control returns.
Procedure complete.
Surgery a success.
This whole process fascinated me.
A rollercoaster of activation and de-activation.
Even though I’ve been through bigger challenges.
This lit me up like a Christmas tree.
The shift.
Chaos to Control.
It showed me my edge.
And proved something I’ve always believed:
You don’t rise to the moment.
You fall back on your training.
A humbling experience.
With some cool feedback from the surgeon:
“That’s some focus you’ve got there, Mr Neill.”
Thank you.
I felt proud.
Because I knew I had put in the training.
And it showed up when I needed it most.
Something I could trust.
A simple process:
Mission.
Focal point.
Breath.
So here’s the question:
What training will you rely on when you find your edge?
Something simple.
That holds under pressure
With Fire,
Coach Damian