Month one on the race was a treat that God gave to my team.
We were on a beautiful island in the Caribbean, surrounded by the sea of seven colors. The island was only 8 miles long, but there was so much to see and do. We enjoyed being on the beach, learning more about the island life and getting to spend time with the people God had placed in our life.
But even on that island there was still a struggle happening within our team.
We left the island all having struggles of our own, but also not really being connected as a team. Our next stop was debrief. (Debrief is a time that the whole squad comes back together and we sit down with our coaches, leaders and mentor to talk about how our month went). We all knew that something heavy was weighing on our team, but none of us wanted to talk about it. We weren’t united like we saw some of the other teams were, but we were all quiet.
We didn’t want to hurt each others feelings, we didn’t want to offend anyone, we didn’t want to let other people into our feelings and we definitely didn’t want to be real with each other.
The day finally arrived when it was our turn to go sit down with the coaches. We walked there in mostly silence hoping to avoid any unrealistic conversations before sitting down. We sat down and they asked us one question and that was all we needed to pop like a balloon.
The next hour or so was filled with tears and more emotions than any of us thought. Little did we know it was exactly what we needed and what was going to allow us to grow – not just individually but together, as a team. As a family.
The next three months were so much better because of it. We still had our time in the pits, but we learned to love each other so well and how to become a unit instead of 7 individuals working by ourselves.
So here is to Selah. To the good times and the bad. The love and the wanting to choke each other. But most importantly to the lasting relationships we built by being forced to live with each other for 4 months.
#LONGLIVESELAH #SELAHFOREVER
