When was the last time you “stepped up to the plate” or had an event come “out of left field?” To all-star third baseman Nathan Brenowitz, who grew up in Brooklyn in the 50’s and who fondly recalls watching baseball for many, many hours with his father, baseball is life itself! Now, Nathan teaches how baseball relates to everyone’s life regarding how we deal with failure, defeat, fear and joy. I had the pleasure of interviewing this avid baseball fan for whom baseball is life’s best metaphor. Here are some examples.
In Everyday Conversation
Baseball metaphors color nearly everything we say to friends, family, and business colleagues. Finishing a business conversation, how often have you said, “Let’s touch base” in a week? Did you “take a raincheck” when you couldn’t make a previously arranged appointment? Distracted by a small setback, were you advised to “keep your eye on the ball?” Were you sympathetic when a low tech friend asked for help with his computer because the problem was “out of his league?”
Baseball fan or not, the sport’s metaphors are imbedded in our communications.
On Failure
Did you ever fail at anything? Perhaps you were rejected in a relationship? Or you lost a sale? Or you lost out on a job interview? How long did you hold on to the disappointment?
Get over it! “Learn from baseball, which is a game of failure!” says Nathan as he points out that most batters miss 75%
of their time up at bat. If they wasted time in self-pity or self-doubt, they would never move on to eventual success.
“When you fail,” says Nathan, “You need to ‘get back in the game!’”
On History
Nathan gets people to discuss the answer to, “How does the past affect you? The people you knew, the events that shaped you, the experiences you had, etc.”
Then, he analogizes the answers to baseball.
When you think of famous “game changers” in the civil rights movement, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. frequently come to mind for their activities in 1955. But Nathan reminds people that when baseball was THE central American sports pastime in 1947, Jackie Robinson actually began the civil rights movement when he broke the baseball color line and became the first Black man to play for a major league team. When the Dodgers signed Robinson, it began the end of racial segregation in professional sports.
The Dodgers started a “whole new ball game” for sports and for American society.
A visit to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown NY highlights, and shows respect for, past great players like Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle. And while the game has perhaps become more aggressive, it has remained basically the same.
Nathan’s lessson: Just as history has brought baseball to where it is today, history has brought our lives to where each of us is today.
Finally, Joy
When have you experienced joy? For Nathan, there is no greater joy than seeing your team hit a home run at the last minute to win the game. Think of it: 50,000 people jumping up and down out of their seats, cheering, yelling, hugging each other, throwing popcorn in the air, smiling, laughing, even crying, for joy at their team’s victory.
First to Final Inning
As Nathan describes it, his course is an opportunity to “step up to the plate” where no one will “strike out” and where everyone will “hit a home run.” AND, in the last session, he gets everyone (of all ages) out on the field to experience the incomparable joy of playing (with a wiffle ball) a full game of baseball!
Batter up!
Anne Miller
Make What You Say Pay! – with Metaphors
P.S. If you want to contact Nathan to share your love of the sport or to ask a question, email NathanBrenowitz@gmail.com
Photo by Daiji Umemoto on Unsplash
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