Topic : Enthusiasm

Enthusiasm is one of the most powerful engines of success. When you do a thing, do it with your might. Put your whole soul into it. Stamp it with your own personality. Be active, be energetic, be enthusiastic and faithful, and you will accomplish your object. Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Bits & Pieces, March 31, 1994, p. 10

Steve Lyons will be remembered as the player who dropped his pants.

He could be remembered as an outstanding infielder . as the player who played every position for the Chicago White Sox . as the guy who always dove into first base . as a favorite of the fans who high fived the guy who caught the foul ball in the bleachers. He could be remembered as an above-average player who made it with an average ability.

But he won’t. He’ll be remembered as the player who dropped his pants on July 16, 1990.

The White Sox were playing the Tigers in Detroit. Lyons bunted and raced down the first-base line. He knew it was going to be tight, so he dove at the bag. Safe! The Tiger’s pitcher disagreed. He and the umpire got into a shouting match, and Lyons stepped in to voice his opinion.

Absorbed in the game and the debate, Lyons felt dirt trickling down the inside of his pants. Without missing a beat he dropped his britches, wiped away the dirt, and . uh oh .twenty thousand jaws hit the bleachers’ floor.

And, as you can imagine, the jokes began. Women behind the White Sox dugout waved dollar bills when he came onto the field. “No one,” wrote one columnist, “had ever dropped his drawers on the field. Not Wally Moon. Not Blue Moon Odom. Not even Heinie Manush.” Within twenty-four hours of the “exposure,” he received more exposure than he’d gotten his entire career; seven live television and approximately twenty radio interviews.

“We’ve got this pitcher, Melido Perex, who earlier this month pitched a no-hitter,” Lyons stated, “and I’ll guarantee you he didn’t do two live television shots afterwards. I pull my pants down, and I do seven. Something’s pretty skewed toward the zany in this game.”

Fortunately, for Steve, he was wearing sliding pants under his baseball pants. Otherwise the game would be rated “R” instead of “PG-13.”

Now, I don’t know Steve Lyons. I’m not a White Sox fan. Nor am I normally appreciative of men who drop their pants in public. But I think Steve Lyons deserves a salute.

I think anybody who dives into first base deserves a salute. How many guys do you see roaring down the baseline of life more concerned about getting a job done than they are about saving their necks? How often do you see people diving headfirst into anything'

Too seldom, right? But when we do . when we see a gutsy human throwing caution to the wind and taking a few risks . ah, now that’s a person worthy of a pat on the . back.

So here’s to all the Steve Lyons in the world.

In the Eye of the Storm by Max Lucado, Word Publishing, 1991, pp. 247-248

Tony Award-winning director Jerry Zaks remembers one of his first acting roles, on tour with Zero Mostel in Fiddler on the Roof. “I had one critical line, ‘Even a poor tailor is entitled to some happiness.’ I was supposed to shout it at Zero, right in his face, and I was sure I was giving my all. But every night, just before the line, he’d whisper, ‘Give it to me. Come on, give it to me.’

“Finally I got so angry I just lost it. I stood up on my toes. I went white; I screamed; I was actually spitting in that face I detested so much, ‘Even a poor tailor is entitled to some happiness!’ And this time, the audience roared. And Zero said to me under his breath, ‘Thaaaat’s it! Thaaaat’s it!”

Today in the Word, February 10, 1993

Eugene Ormandy dislocated his shoulder while conducting the Philadelphia orchestra. Maurice Boyd, in his book The Enthusiasms of Robertson Davies, speculated that Ormandy may have been conducting Brahms. In the margin of one of his symphonies Brahms wrote, “As loud as possible!” Only a few bars later, however, he wrote in “Louder still!”

I do not know what they were playing, but he was giving all of himself to it! And I have asked myself sadly, ‘Did I ever dislocate anything, even a necktie?’”

Progress Magazine, December 31, 1992

• Enthusiasm without knowledge is like running in the dark. Get on fire for God and men will come to see you burn. - John Wesley
• If you aren’t fired with enthusiasm, you will be fired with enthusiasm. - Vince Lombardi

Sources unknown

That certain something that makes us great—that pulls us out of the mediocre and commonplace—that builds into us power. It glows and shines—it lights up our faces—ENTHUSIASM, the keynote that makes us sing and makes men sing with us. ENTHUSIASM—the maker of friends—the maker of smiles—the producer of confidence. It cries to the world, “I’ve got what it takes.” It tells all men that our job is a swell job—that the house which we work for just suits us—the goods we have are the best. ENTHUSIASM—the inspiration that makes us “wake up and live.” It puts spring in our step—spring in our hearts—a twinkle in our eyes and gives us confidence in ourselves and our fellow men. ENTHUSIASM—it changes a dead pan salesman to a producer—a pessimist to an optimist—a loafer to a go-getter. ENTHUSIASM—If we have it, we should thank God for it. If we don’t have it, then we should get down on our knees and pray for it.

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Upon the plains of hesitation,
bleached the bones of countless millions
who, on the threshold of victory,
sat down to wait, and waiting they died.

Source unknown