Life Lessons and the Art of Snowboarding

I picked up snowboarding way later than most of my friends, so I got to watch them doing 360 tail grabs while i was still falling on my ass every 5 seconds. I learned quickly though and my first season on a board my buds were already taking me on tree runs. I put some good nicks on my board, good bruises on my butt, shoulders and hands from hitting trees. One of my buddies, after noticing how sap covered I came out of the trees, told me some of the best advice I have ever learned that carries through to others sports and even life itself. "Pick a path and look where you want to go, not at the trees!" It was hard to get myself to do it-how do you not look at that tree you're about to collide with and hard!? But I quickly found out he was so right. When I ignored the trees, suddenly I wasn't headed for them anymore.
A couple weeks ago I took a motorcycle training course where we were instructed to weave some offset cones. At first it seemed nearly impossible not to hit the cones. Sure enough though, the instructor told us "You will go where you look! If you look at the cone you will hit it!" So when I applied my snowboarding skills and looked through the obstacles at my path, suddenly it was easy.
I think we can apply this to life. Don't get so caught up in our present struggles to the point we're not looking at the overall picture of where we're headed. Wow, this is way more inspirational than the usual JWU blog...now I need to write something really stupid. I'll be right back.