Batter Up

On the Ball Field of Life

Mar 17, 2024

“Love is the most important thing in the world, but baseball is pretty good, too.”

Yogi Berra

I know what you’re thinking, baseball seems like a departure from what I normally write about but to me, any field is the perfect subject for taking field notes about life. I was lucky enough to attend two Blue Jays games at their spring training camp in Dunedin, Florida with my parents this month so I have baseball on my mind. I’ve been reflecting on its’ influence on our family, culture, and even our language.

Today let’s take a look at the game of baseball through a metaphysical lens to see what it can teach us about overcoming some of the tenents that have been limiting us as human beings.

If you are a new subscriber, you may not know that Baseball is BIG in my family.

My brother and I played in our youth and I still have my soft MacGregor glove.

Our boys played and now our nephews who range in age from 7 to 16 play, but arguably the biggest ball fan in our family is surprisingly my Mother, or “Nana” as she is affectionately called.

My Dad “GG” is a good sport and usually keeps her company - they have had the same season ticket seats to the Spring Training camp for years, a tradition generously started as a gift by my brother and sister-in-law who have also been coaching and driving their kids to ballparks and practice domes for years.

Our nephews Stryder and Dax even have part-time jobs as umpires - these are outdated pictures (below) that I took of them in action that I happened to have on my phone (they are teenage giants now) but they have both grown up on the ball field.

The discipline, different team tryouts, hours of practicing, managing injuries, and learning how to be encouraging and dependable teammates on various successful teams have molded them into exceptional human beings. Of course, we’d love them either way, but let’s just say that the sport of baseball has had a huge influence on them.

Some of you reading may not follow baseball and yet many of you use the idioms of baseball every day. They have a way of seeping into our conversations -I was just telling Scott this morning on our walk that it’s surprising how many we still use.

One of baseball’s most famous moments was the home run by Bobby Thomson to win the 1951 World Series for the New York Giants, the “shot heard round the world.” As Yogi Berra aptly put it: “It ain’t over ‘til it’s over.”

Most of us have heard that saying more than once, Scott and I heard it again last night while watching the great docuseries called “Dynasty” about Tom Brady and the New England Patriots in the episode where they play Atlanta in the Superbowl and come from behind to win it in the last minute of the game.

I’m sure there are many, many more baseball sayings, but for fun skim down this list and see if you recognize or still use some of the 15 more commonly used ones:

To succeed at something is to hit it out of the park
When we take initiative or try our very best we are said to be stepping up to the plate or leaving everything out on the field
High performers with a reputation for getting results are known as big hitters
Being strategic is playing smart ball
Less benevolent strategies or tough negotiations are when someone is playing hardball
An unexpected response is known as being thrown a curveball or we can be caught off base
If we want to connect we will often say we’ll touch base and if we can’t make it we’ll take a rain check
A viewpoint unconnected or unexpected comes out of left field,
If we do an amazing job at a task we knock the cover off the ball
A fresh start or something different is a whole new ballgame
Welcome to the major leagues when we get a big promotion
When we anticipate or think of everything we cover our bases
When there is a 50:50 chance of something happening we say it’s hit or miss,
Something or someone is a little off base when things feel not quite right
In dating, we judge if someone is out of his/her league, and do any of us make it out of puberty without knowing exactly what happens at different bases? ;)

This past month it occurred to me that watching baseball seems more exciting than it used to.

I can’t quite put my finger on it.

Maybe it was the steady stream of high-flying foul balls coming hard and fast overhead. My mom and I were making cringy yikes faces at each other when they flew up over the dome towards the parking lot at high speed (in the general direction of our vehicle in our lucky front row spot) wondering if the windshield would still be intact when we got out. It was:)

Or maybe because it’s FUN.

Since covid it feels different to me somehow - I no longer take group atmospheres for granted. The families, the loud pump-up music, and clapping together in unison.

Photo credit: Dan Hamilton USA Today Sports/Reuters

It’s such a rare opportunity to sit in the stands surrounded by the electrifying energy of a happy crowd of baseball fans.

One of the main reasons I felt inspired to write this piece is of course metaphysical, so let’s cover that right off the bat (pun intended:) then I’ll finish off with 8 powerful lessons that the game of baseball has to offer all of us.

It all started with something profound that happened to me in November of 2020.

It’s hard to find the right words to describe it without sounding like I may have been hit in the head with a bat and a ball myself, but in a nutshell, I had a spontaneous experience where the room filled with a bright light and I was suddenly filled with a tremendous feeling of love for everyone. It was the most unexpected and beautiful thing I’ve ever experienced.

For months and even a couple of years later, I felt a strong urge to demonstrate that love and express my affection through friendliness.

I felt drawn to total strangers in a new inexplicable way.

We all know that life is not all sunshine and double plays, but it’s as though I was experiencing myself and all of life in a new way.

I was still me and it was as though nothing changed physically, but I noticed that I could sit and listen to strangers without judging them. COVID vaccinations, politics, work, and strained relationships, all I felt was compassion toward them.

I was somehow different than I was before. I felt different. It was like I was sitting up in the nosebleed section of life and I could see more, I sensed our common human identity, our need for happiness, meaning, and purpose. Our interconnectedness.

It suddenly made so much more sense to me to connect, rather than compete and fight.

It’s like this one moment shifted my perception and prevented me from seeing others as separate, but rather as a whole human race. It’s been four years and I still don’t have a political identity like most people do, Liberal or Conservative, Democrat or Republican. It feels to me that the highest political expression is both liberal and conservative.

My attitude to everything has changed.

I enjoy a ball game and my life now for the game’s sake, but I’ve transcended any notion of group identity in myself and others. I no longer see ethnicity, nationality, and religion - I see us as a whole.

And yet it’s true when it comes to sports that I still love certain teams like the Blue Jays and The Miami Dolphins but probably because my Mother and our Son love them and I’m happy for them when they win and it’s fun to have a favorite team.

It feels shocking to me now when I hear booing or hate slurs at games towards the opposing team and I’m quickly brought back to earth and reminded of how a mind and ego work. When there is violence between home fans and visiting teams, and people are hurt or property is damaged after a hard loss it’s like I understand their need to support their specific team, but now it strikes me as a bit absurd and sad. It even happens in Little Leagues around the world and brings out the worst in all of us.

As parents, we may be surprised to witness other parents or even find ourselves exchanging unkind words at our kids’ sports games with other parents or criticizing referees or other parents out loud or in the car on the drive home with our children listening closely to our every word.

What’s going on?

It’s just a game.

Why do we feel so defensive and threatened?

FEAR.

Fear is the only reason we ever lie, exaggerate, cheat, steal, or feel the need to win at any cost. We’ll do things that compromise our integrity and then lie about doing it.

This fear and need for being the one in power or on top is responsible for much of the conflict and brutality that has filled human history.

Most wars have been fought between two or more opposing groups.

Religious groups like Catholics and Protestants or Muslims and Hindus, ethnic groups like Serbs, Bosnians, and Croatians, or the Tusti and Hutu in Rwanda; or ideological factions such as communists and fascists. Group identity has led to campaigns of persecution and mass murder, such as the Holocaust or the untouchables under the Indian caste system, racism, and inequality. Human beings are defined by these separate groups and are not regarded as sacred beings or individuals but as members of a different and inferior group.

We judge others by the color of the jersey they wear.

Does anyone else find it interesting that in most sports the home team often wears the white or lighter colored jersey and the away or visiting team wears their darker tones?

When we strongly identify with a group, we are more liable to restrict our empathy and altruism to our fellow, withholding them from our group.

Psychologists call this “moral exclusion”. Where if you’re not on my team you’re my rival. I feel threatened by you and I blame you for my problems.

Our egos also feel defeated and threatened when we lose. And sadly it becomes possible for us to judge, exploit, oppress, and even beat or kill the “other”.

You may have heard of this incident from your news feed back in January at a stadium parking lot in Miami when 30-year-old Dylan Brody Isaacs from Ontario and his friends were returning to their vehicle after a Sunday night game, they had an altercation with the driver of another vehicle from another team. The driver pulled out a gun and fired several shots at Isaacs, who died at the scene.

Most of us of course realize on some level that it’s just a game for our entertainment, but if we attach to our ego and separate ourselves, we’ll quickly find ourselves rationalizing behavior that we’d never do in our right mind.

We become oblivious, righteous, and downright rude. We’re not bad people, we are just identifying with our ego or material mind.

One moment we can feel inspired (in spirit), experience awe, and even get goosebumps and tears listening to a national anthem with our caps off feeling connected and then next we’re rivals.

It’s not even just the players that get sucked in, as spectators when the umpire makes a bad call against our team for the third time in a row we can feel our hackles go up and we boo.

Our consciousness seems to rise and fall in our frequencies all day long according to our level of awareness.

This can be felt in the field of life in every way. At work, in our romantic relationships, and especially being a parent can be one of our greatest spiritual teachers.

Before my awakening experience, I can clearly remember the ups and downs of riding that see-saw of consciousness, especially as a young parent. After a good sleep, coffee, and my morning routine, I felt like Julie Andrews…

But by dinner time the boys would probably describe me more like this…

Can we still be good parents, support our kids, love sports, have a favorite home team, and transcend any illusion of group identity to the common identity of all human beings?

YES!

Can we move past ethnicity, nationality, and religion to the formless essence that expresses itself purely and equally in everyone?

ABSOLUTELY!

In the process, we can extend empathy and altruism to the whole human race.

There are so many powerful lessons available to us from baseball. Here are a handful that came to me:

1. Staying Awake

Baseball moves slowly. Some joke that they’d prefer to watch paint dry. A baseball game usually lasts about three hours, although there is no clock, so it goes on until it’s over. Very few sports are like that.

Baseball invites you to relax, reflect, and chat with friends and get to know the people seated around you.

My mom knows so much about the game that it’s especially fun to watch with her.

For me, she gives the game context. She tells me about the players, their playing history, injuries, and even their personal lives. She logs their stats. My mom is ALL in. She pays attention not just to the Jays but to everything. It’s her superpower.

Like baseball, the game of life also seems to play out slowly. The boredom “between pitches” in our lives can sometimes get the better of us. Instead of being in the present moment, we distract ourselves or get lost in a storm of unhelpful thoughts. If you’re not sure this is you, sit still and do nothing for 5 minutes.

If you have an untrained human brain, you are going to want to move or feel compelled to DO something. It’s why it’s so hard for us to learn to meditate at first with an untrained mind.

We naturally seem to reach outside of ourselves to feel better. We’ll go for our phones or our wallets, we’ll even risk having to remortgage our homes to pay the man with the big foam hat and funny voice walking around announcing “Ice cold beer here” at the ballpark.

When we feel something we don’t want to feel or can’t control life, we will avoid the feeling rather than just feeling it and allowing it to pass on through us.

There is another significant way we avoid boredom or hearing something we don’t want to hear even at a ball game.

We fall asleep.

A helpful life tip from Mateo Peluso: If you’re going to lie down on your Zoom calls it’s best to turn off your camera.

For many fans, attending a live sporting event is a riveting experience- far superior to sitting on their couch and watching the game at home, but this gallery of photos I pulled off the internet tells another story.

These were taken from different sports, from the US Open in Tennis, Football playoff games and even the Masters in golf (cameraman snoozing while Justin Rose tees off at the 13th hole at the Masters in 2008) is a tribute to all of us who sometimes doze off in life at the wrong time.

This is probably why they invented the “Seventh inning stretch” which is something we should maybe consider bringing into our daily life.

Just a pause. A walk, a break, some fresh air, and some music in our daily round in the afternoon to refresh ourselves.

In case you’re not familiar with it, it’s a long-standing tradition that takes place between the halves of the seventh inning of a game. Fans generally stand up and stretch out their arms and legs and sometimes walk around and often play the crowd sing-along song "Take Me Out to the Ball Game".

I love seeing my parents standing, clapping, and following Ace the mascot’s raised arm prompts while singing “OK…OK..BLUE JAYS…BLUE JAYS…LET’S….PLAY…BALL”.

That never happens at home and it’s probably why most of us doze off on our couches but we can bring the 7th inning stretch with us wherever we go.

2. Show Me the Money

So then why on earth do we pile our exhausted bodies into the stands and still love being entertained by baseball so much?

I’d like to think it’s because we love the game. The last game I was at it was sold out. Standing room only.

The numbers tell another story…it’s also BIG business. The 2023 revenue from the MLB was $11.6 billion.

One thing I admire about baseball is that it’s one of the more affordable sports to watch and accessible to the average family. Especially the spring training games. My ticket was only $16 and the average ticket to see the Toronto Maple Leafs is $322 which is not ideal if you have 3 kids that love hockey.

The average professional baseball player makes around $2 million but someone like Los Angeles Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani (currently the highest-paid player in major league baseball) has an astonishing salary of $70 million this season which is similar to what a top Hollywood Actor is paid (last year that was Adam Sandler at $73 million).

Los Angeles Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani and actor Adam Sandler

Adam Sandler is a household name and I wonder how many of us would recognize Shohei Ohtani if he walked by us on the street?

Either way, we’ll empty our wallets to be entertained and because it’s fun to be together watching the best in the world play a sport we adore making memories with the ones we love.

Some would even say it’s priceless.

3. Batting with A Higher Power

If you attended an elementary school in North America, chances are that you’ve had a turn at bat. You probably remember that uncomfortable, familiar anticipation and nervous feeling of your name being called. Choosing your bat, carefully lining up our feet with home plate, and looking at the pitcher just waiting for the pitch to come.

This is one of the phenomenal things about both - failing daily, is not just a part of baseball, it’s a part of life.

We have three tries because a swing and a miss is a natural occurrence.

A good baseball player with a batting average of .300 is failing 70% of the time.

Wow.

What other sport does this happen in? Can you imagine someone missing tennis or their golf shots 70% of the time?

These players carry their previous batting experiences each time they step into the batter’s box and it’s OK.

In the same way that every single morning we wake up we carry our previous day’s experiences with us each time our feet hit the ground out of bed. Our minds will have 70-80% of the same thoughts and we’ll make the same mistakes we made yesterday AND IT’S OK.

When we do get up to bat we often feel compelled to seek spiritual reinforcement or find ourselves in some sort of a silent negotiation.

My two favorite hitters are Vladdy and Bo on the Jays.

They both have HUGE swings and swing for the fences every time they are up.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is especially fun to watch. He has such a pleasing energy on the field and when he approaches home plate to bat he has a beautiful ritual:

First, he holds the bat by the barrel, and with the handle of the bat, he reaches down and writes ‘Dios’ into the dirt of the home plate circle— “God” in Spanish.
Then he takes the bat and he taps the catcher, and he taps the umpire—a show of respect. No one seems to mind, I read that he’s done that ever since he was little. His way of connecting to the Divine and no one has ever told him to stop.
Then he steps in and waggles the bat.
I’ve noticed that now and then, he’ll rest it on his right shoulder for a moment, and he seems calm and comfortable.
He stares out to the mound. You’re never sure if he’s going to uncork on the first pitch or just sit there and keep staring waiting for the right pitch.

It works. He got a home run at the game I was watching.

He’s magic. But he also fails and strikes out.

He’s not alone with his pre-hit rituals. Many of the players also wear a big gold or diamond-encrusted necklace as a symbol of success, others wear a religious symbol like a cross, and many kiss it before going up to bat. I remember the day our son Gordie who has never set foot in a church asked us for a chain with a crucifix on it. He wanted some of that pro-athlete magic. He wore it every day for a very long time.

Players sometimes point to the sky after they’ve made a hit. Is it an open expression of gratitude? Giving all the credit to God?

It seems that way to me. An acknowledgment that we are just vessels for the divine to work through us when we are aligned and open to it.

What would our own lives be like if we lived more devotionally?

Can I please also state the obvious? Do any of us believe that God cares if we hit a ball with a bat or strike out or are we giving that all the meaning it has?

Is God not also in the dugout of the losing team?

Whatever the case, let’s all remember today that it’s okay to fail. When Babe Ruth broke the record for most home runs in a season he also struck out more than any other player.

4. Going to Church

For Annie Savoy (Susan Sarandon’s character in the movie Bull Durham, she committed herself to what she called “the Church of baseball”…

“I believe in the Church of Baseball. I’ve tried all the major religions and most of the minor ones. I’ve worshipped Buddha, Allah, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, trees, mushrooms, and Isadora Duncan. I know things. For instance, there are 108 beads in a Catholic rosary and there are 108 stitches in a baseball. When I heard that, I gave Jesus a chance. But it just didn’t work out between us. The Lord laid too much guilt on me. I prefer metaphysics to theology. You see, there’s no guilt in baseball, and it’s never boring… It’s a long season and you gotta trust. I’ve tried ’em all, I really have, and the only church that truly feeds the soul, day in, day out, is the Church of Baseball.”

I love that scene.

Maybe she’s onto something.

Find what feeds YOUR soul, not someone else’s. There is no “right” way, only a way that is right for you.

5. LISTENING TO OUR INNER BASE COACH

I never would have believed that the 1989 American sports fantasy drama film written and directed by Phil Alden Robinson, based on Canadian novelist W. P. Kinsella's 1982 novel Shoeless Joe movie “Field of Dreams” could ever have been art imitating life, but this movie is no longer fictional to me now.

“If you build it, they will come”

An inner voice heard by Ray

He built it and they came.

I’d like to share a true story that one of my teachers Jon Gabriel shared about an experience that happened to him that has had a profound effect on me. I’m more open and willing to listen to the whispers in my head because of it. Call it intuition, the Shakina, or the Holy Spirit it doesn’t matter, but it's a viable bridge to perception between us and the Divine or our “Higher Self”.

Jon is a biochemist with a degree in Economics. He was in New York and needed to get to San Fransisco for an important meeting with investors to fund a big project, but right before he boarded his flight, he felt a strong and compelling inner voice telling him NOT to board.

It made ZERO rational sense to his Wharton School of Business mind. He surprised even himself when he didn’t board at the last minute, but before the end of the day, he wept in gratitude for listening to that voice.

It was September 11, 2001, and he had a seat on the United Airlines flight 93 that was hijacked by terrorists. His intended flight crashed into an open field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, killing all passengers, crew members, and terrorists on board.

This incident changed his whole life. Up until then, he worked all of the time. He was unhealthy, unhappy, and unbalanced. After this spiritual experience, he had one of the most remarkable physical transformations of all time.

Just like on the baseball field, there are coaches at every base around the diamond we can listen to who are there to help us get home. In life, if we are willing and open to guidance we can access our inner coaches whispering to us on behalf of our higher self.

When we do we’ll be shown the bigger play for our Soul’s evolution and it won’t always make sense to our rational or material mind but can be trusted 100% of the time.

6. WINNING BY LOSING

From our first “T-ball” game to the major leagues and everything in between life is just an experience of ourselves in relationship to one another.

It would seem that our human egos want to “win” at all costs simply because we’ll somehow be better. More acceptable. More admired and loved.

“The first will be last and the last will be first.”

Jesus

In my own experience, the best has come to me when I have lost.

Winning may bring awards, accolades, and money, but it does not mean anything in the bigger picture of our soul’s existence other than the meaning you give it.

From a higher or “Christ-consciousness” perspective, number 17 in the red shirt along with all of the kids in blue riding the bench on all of the losing teams around the world and Shohei Ohtani or Joe DiMaggio are the same.

A perfect part of creation.

Made in the image and likeness of the source that created us all in our perfection.

In life, no matter what belief system or construct of faith we were handed at birth it can be easy to forget that while we all may be born to play for different teams and wear different uniforms like Halloween costumes, there is only one World Series when it comes to life and we’re all on the same team.

We just get traded around.

We share one pool and one turf.

We can separate ourselves in our imaginations or perceptions into Eastern and Western divisions or geographical Hemispheres with imaginary lines on maps, but at the end of the day when we take a cosmic perspective there is no real separation between our teams or even our countries, it’s all made up by us.

For fun. For the love of the game.

And don’t get me wrong, it IS fun.

Life and competing can be fun and can help us grow if we don’t identify with it as ultimate.

We may even benefit by getting injured and maybe even temporarily losing our positions. Every game we play is the perfect experience for our own soul’s evolution.

No more permanent than the chalk outlining the bases and home plate. We can relax and allow things to unfold naturally no matter what, it’s all good in the long run.

7. Coming Home

I find it fascinating that the goal of the whole game of baseball is different from most other sports where there is a net, a hole, or a hoop to put the ball in or through.

In baseball, the object is to hit the ball, but the goal is for the batter to come home, to get back to home plate.

Just like in our spiritual lives, we are here to help walk each other home. To remember or realize the truth of our being.

In baseball one of the major ways to help get your teammates back home, around the diamond to home plate, is to sacrifice for them.

A sacrifice play means that you don’t get credit for it but it advances the runner.

Walks, bunts, and sacrifice flies, which are good hits but caught for an out, while advancing the runner are examples. The key to this game and the game of life is sacrifice.

In my life, the most beloved people who I hold closest to my heart have sacrificed something for me.

Like my parents. My husband. My In-laws.

There is something about the generosity of spirit and helping another that is deeply moving and life-giving for all of us to remember.

8. Transcendent moments

Some plays seem to transcend space and time. You know the ones…

Like a long ball heading over the fence for a home run until a player in the outfield leaps at the precise moment to connect with the ball and hold it majestically in his glove.

Or the poetic double play in which the shortstop tosses to the second baseman who then twists like a ballerina in mid-air throwing perfectly to first base.

Or the play at home plate when the runner slides ten feet–and a bit out of the baseline–while managing to brush the bag with his hand or foot to avoid the catcher’s tag.

These plays make us get to our feet and leave us awe-struck.

They feel divine. Special. Like something extraordinary has just happened.

They keep bringing us back for more.

Today was a simple reminder that we all create our personal and collective experiences from a field of possibilities. So the next time you hear the cry “Play ball!” remember that baseball is MUCH more than just pleasant recreation.

It can direct us to realities beyond itself and offers helpful pointers for the game of life.

With love,

Rev Nona