Real World Resilience: Cowboys Kicker Brandon Aubrey

A Story of Hard Work, Perseverance & Resilience

I just finished a series of posts on the topic of resilience. (Click here if you would like to read that series.) Meanwhile, NFL football started back in full swing. We were feeling the draught at our house. How about you? It’s my opinion that sports is the best TV programming out there nowadays! Anyway...I digress...

In the NFL week 2 we were gobbling up multiple games, and hit upon the Dallas Cowboys versus the New York Giants.

Well, let’s just say, the fans of football everywhere got introduced to Brandon Aubrey, if you weren't already aware of this rising star.

At 30 years of age and in only his third season as an NFL kicker, he was setting records by the game. Against the Giants, he kicked a 64-yard field goal to force an overtime! Then just after pushing the game into OT, he hit a 46-yard field goal as time expired to win it for Dallas, 40-37.

Suddenly, his name was on the lips of every sports fan! Who is this Aubrey guy? I did what every curious fan was doing: jumped on the web to find out his story.

What I found was not an overnight success, but the story of a hard-working, perseverant, talented young man who has displayed resilience throughout his young life.

Brandon’s journey to the NFL...

✔️ Based on media research, (which has blown up since Brandon’s record-setting performance in week 2),  Brandon’s overnight success probably started with a supportive environment in his childhood. Apparently, his parents instilled a strong work ethic and were present to cheer him on in his early athletic ventures in pee-wee football and soccer.

✔️ Because of the parental support and freedom to explore his interests, Brandon discovered his talent for soccer. He enjoyed much success in the well-developed youth and club soccer programs of Plano, Texas. Although he played football in middle school, by the time he was in high school all his efforts were focused on soccer, where his excellence won him several honors, and eventually led to collegiate scholarship opportunities.

✔️Brandon went to Notre Dame on a soccer scholarship and was recognized for his performance – All-ACC honors, soccer All-American, etc. After college, he entered the 2017 MLS SuperDraft and was picked 21^st overall by Toronto FC. But he did not break through into the main roster; and he eventually transitioned out of professional sports.

✔️He pivoted his focus to using his degree from Notre Dame to become a software engineer. Meanwhile, his wife encouraged him to think about trying kicking in American football. She would watch an NFL game and say, “You could do that!,” referring to seeing successful field goal kicks of signifigance distance.

✔️And so, Brandon started training with a kicking coach a few times a week during his off hours of his day job, gradually developing his placekicking skills. In 2022 he was drafted into the United States Football League (USFL) as his first gig as a kicker.

✔️He performed well – leading in several kicking categories – and helped his team, the Stallions, win championships both years he was their kicker. This drew attention from the NFL...

✔️In July 2023, he signed on with the Dallas Cowboys. And wasted no time breaking records: Among them, the most consecutive field goals made to start an NFL career; very high percentage from long distance (50+ yards); setting franchise records for the Cowboys (e.g. longest field goal in a regular game).

Every place you see a ✔️is a data point in Brandon’s timeline where he was being shaped into his future self – his values were being formed, his decision-making  and response patterns were being fashioned. And all of this development occurred over what appears to be the foundation of a stable, supportive family environment.

It seems that all along his experiences, he was also learning and choosing how he would respond to situations set before him.

What I observe is his choices seem to reflect the qualities that make up a life of developing resilience.

Remember, one of the basic definitions I shared of resilience is: The ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change.  

How essential is that quality for a football kicker when any one game can include multiple opportunities for success or failure – and not just for himself, but for his team and their entire season?! I can’t imagine the pressure a kicker has to handle being singular in center-stage, with all eyes on you, with only one shot at putting it through the uprights each time.

Brandon Aubrey’s story reminds us that resilience is rarely an overnight success. It’s the result of daily choices, hard work, and the willingness to grow through what you go through. His journey is proof that setbacks can become setups for something greater.

In the end, what makes Brandon Aubrey stand out isn’t just his leg strength—it’s his character. Calm under pressure, humble in victory, grateful in the journey. These are the same qualities each of us can cultivate in our own arenas of life.

I invite you to consider:

·       Identify one resilience trait you’d like to strengthen—focus on it this week.

·       Pray (or meditate) on the areas of your life where you need resilience right now.

·       Encourage someone on your team, at work or at home, who may be “under pressure.”

·       Share your own “grow through what you go through” story with someone close to you.

*My offer of support: If you contact me via ‘chat w/ me’ on Perils & Pearls, I will gift you a thirty-minute coaching session to talk about how you might develop your resilience through the struggle(s) you are currently facing.

*And if you have been stirred to further explore your unique wiring – strengths, passions, challenges - & you would like to experience a strength assessment with a certified life coach, I invite you to contact me.

If you would like to follow me on this adventure, and receive notice whenever I post something new, please subscribe. (It’s simple – at the top and bottom of every page on the Perils & Pearls blog site. *No need to be a 'member.')

**A word about POSTING COMMENTS: I LV engaging with your feedback/responses to my writings! But, if you run into tech obstacles when trying to post a comment, please feel free to do as so many of you have done: Send me a private message using the "Let's Chat" option on the Perils & Pearls Home Page.

And if you know people who would benefit from the support, and/or enjoy the short writings, please share the site or a post with them. Heck, just share it on your social media…Let’s grow it together! 

Blessed to play a part ~

g

Part 5: Bend Not Break – A Resilience Practice for Everyday Life

Building a Life That Bends, Not Breaks

This is the final installment of considering the concept of resilience. (Go here if you would like to read the other four parts of the series.) I’d like to get practical in this post:

Since resilience is a trait that we can strengthen through practice, what does that look like in an everyday setting? How do you build a life that bends, not breaks?

Take a look at my title image. That guy holding the bent rod is our son, Nick. He has been fishing since he was three (right alongside his seven-year-old sister). Four decades later, he is a master fly fisherman with an unquenchable passion for catching every type of fish, in every different setting, all over the world - from the surf of an ocean, in a stream or a river, or from a boat.

And I can tell you this for sure: he has learned to pick the right rod for the type of fishing he is doing. He knows using the correct rod according to how it is made is one of the most essential parts of successful fishing. It’s all about the rod flex:

A fly rod flexes to store and release energy: as you cast, the rod bends under the weight of the line, then straightens to propel the line forward smoothly and with control. This flex also absorbs sudden strain from a hooked fish, preventing the line from snapping. As rod size (length and weight rating) increases, the flex tends to become stronger and deeper to handle greater casting loads.

In the realm of resilience, we could say, it is all about our flex

We store and release (body and brain) energy as we navigate the challenges of life – big and small – in hopes of bending, not breaking. When we feel the sudden strain of an event, we hope our resilience will absorb it, preventing us – our mind-body stress response -  from snapping. As we practice and apply resilience, it becomes stronger and deeper, able to handle greater loads.

Before I dug deeper into resilience I had not realized the superpower of this trait. My newly heightened awareness compels me to pay attention to the development of it in my daily life.

From the thoughts we think to the stories we tell, resilience is a lifestyle—one we can nurture with intention. Here are a few of the factors I focus on for my resilience practice:

·      Start with a perspective check: (Jeremiah 18) The image of God as the potter, reshaping marred clay into something new, reminds us: we are not disposable. We are redeemable. He is making something beautiful.

·      Thought life can kill resilience – We can all distort reality. Here is a list of Cognitive Distortions to be aware of and identity in our thought lives:

·      Disappointment management and sizing – This is not a one-time learning. Disappointments do not stop; improving our response to and sizing of them cannot stop either.

·      The sky is always blue. Gratitude works. Magnify the positive. Go to the good – it is always there.

·      Be receptive to a group narrative rewrite – In safe relationships are opportunities for telling our stories truer, and those connections can nurture our transformed selves.

As mentioned above, in the well-known passage of old testament scripture in the eighteenth chapter of Jeremiah, God is in the role of the potter, and we are the clay. He shapes and reshapes us as He deems best. When the pot is cracked, He creates something new and beautiful out of the same clay.

In a similar framework, I can see God as the kintsugi artist, expertly, painstakingly, lovingly putting the broken pieces back together, filling the fractures with precious gold, giving the brokenness one-of-a-kind beauty and emphasis, not hiding it or obliterating the whole vessel.

May I leave you with a question to ponder?

Which resilience practice resonates with you most? Choose one to try this week.

 (And if you're willing, post one of your resilience practices with #BendNotBreak.)

*My offer of support: If you contact me via ‘chat w/ me’ on Perils & Pearls, I will gift you a thirty-minute coaching session to talk about how you might develop your resilience through the struggle(s) you are currently facing.

*And if you have been stirred to further explore your unique wiring – strengths, passions, challenges - & you would like to experience a strength assessment with a certified life coach, I invite you to contact me.

If you would like to follow me on this adventure, and receive notice whenever I post something new, please subscribe. (It’s simple – at the top and bottom of every page on the Perils & Pearls blog site. *No need to be a 'member.')

**A word about POSTING COMMENTS: I LV engaging with your feedback/responses to my writings! But, if you run into tech obstacles when trying to post a comment, please feel free to do as so many of you have done: Send me a private message using the "Let's Chat" option on the Perils & Pearls Home Page.

And if you know people who would benefit from the support, and/or enjoy the short writings, please share the site or a post with them. Heck, just share it on your social media…Let’s grow it together! 

Blessed to play a part ~

g

Part 4: Pancakes in a Snowstorm – How Creativity Can Emerge from Crisis

A Story of Improvisation

Let's take a look at another aspect of resilience. (The topic I have been exploring in the last several blog posts. To read the other three on resilience go here.)

Have you ever considered how necessity can bring out creativity?

Coming from a family of eleven, the ability to make something out of nothing wasn't a nicety; it was a survival skill! And one that has served me through the various trials and tribulations of adult life as well.

Many moons ago, when my daughter was in Girl Scouts, I was one of the parent chaperones for an April camping weekend. The cabin was bustling and busting from the adolescent energy of about twenty-five eleven-year-olds and a handful of wide-eyed adults. The girls were prepared with buddy-burners to prove their fire-starting and outdoor cooking skills in hopes of attaining the prize of a Girl Scout badge that would then be proudly displayed on their uniform sashes.

But on the first morning of the campout we awoke to a shocking view outside the windows: Overnight the weather had a taken an unforeseen turn from spring temperatures to more than a foot of snow! The next telltale of impeding problems was the discovery of a loss of power.

 Buddy Burners to the Rescue

With no power to the stovetop, what do you feed a herd of giddy girls who are not dismayed over the snowstorm shock, but rather biting at the bit to get out in it and make snow angels?

Well, my big-family training came forward in my prefrontal cortex to solve this problem. I inventoried our food supply and found pancake mix and syrup. Hmm...Why not use the buddy burners to cook pancakes for breakfast? The troop leaders and other chaperones gave me the crazy look, then moved aside to give me the con. I summoned the girls and requested they gather all the buddy burners.

My almost subversive idea made them squeal with delight!

In the end, I and a couple of brave accomplices, had flipped about one hundred mini-pancakes on the surfaces of a couple dozen buddy burners. The girls assisted enough to get their badge credit and then ran outside without any winter-ready apparel to play in the snow.

Meanwhile, the adults went to the next problem to solve: How were we going to dig out our vehicles to escape the surprise winter wonderland? Hmm...

To analyze that comical campout now, I wonder, was it more nature or nurture that caused my brain to create an out-of-the-box solution to feeding the troop? Depending on where you turn for the answers, you can be swayed in either direction. What stands out to me now, in the context of resilience, is how my perceived deficits in childhood showed up as an asset in this snowstorm scenario.

My mother was famous for saying “Necessity is the mother of invention!” She was right!

Researchers agree that no matter the mix of genetics, personality traits, and  early life experiences, resilience can be developed with intention. In fact, I was bolstered to learn:

Those of us who may have had something foundational lacking in our childhoods can actually have an advantage in regard to our capability to face and recover from disappointments and hardships.

 The American Psychological Association has written much on the effects of early environments on adults’ ability to draw on and even strengthen resilience when facing the inevitable disappointments and adversities of all the seasons of life.

When children face challenges and disappointments in a supportive environment, they develop the emotional, social, and cognitive tools needed to navigate adversity, recover from setbacks, and even move on strengthened. On the other hand, children in unsupportive environments must tackle significant challenges in developing resilience, but they are not without hope. With the right interventions, positive influences, and opportunities for growth, many can overcome these difficulties and build the emotional and mental strength needed to thrive.

Crisis or lack can bring out creativity, and also become a catalyst for resilience.

As you consider my lighthearted example of the improvisation that came out of an unpredictable and uncontrollable challenge, may I offer some food for thought for exploring this topic in your own story?

Think back to a time you solved a problem creatively under pressure. What did you use? Who benefited? Share your resilience win, if you’d like.

*My offer of support: If you contact me via ‘chat w/ me’ on Perils & Pearls, I will gift you a thirty-minute coaching session to talk about how you might develop your resilience through the struggle(s) you are currently facing.

*And if you have been stirred to further explore your unique wiring – strengths, passions, challenges - & you would like to experience a strength assessment with a certified life coach, I invite you to contact me.

If you would like to follow me on this adventure, and receive notice whenever I post something new, please subscribe. (It’s simple – at the top and bottom of every page on the Perils & Pearls blog site. *No need to be a 'member.')

**A word about POSTING COMMENTS: I LV engaging with your feedback/responses to my writings! But, if you run into tech obstacles when trying to post a comment, please feel free to do as so many of you have done: Send me a private message using the "Let's Chat" option on the Perils & Pearls Home Page.

And if you know people who would benefit from the support, and/or enjoy the short writings, please share the site or a post with them. Heck, just share it on your social media…Let’s grow it together! 

Blessed to play a part ~

g