Does A Good Defense Lead To a Good Offense?

Answer these two questions:
What are you defending for?
What are you defending against?

Does a good defense lead to a good offense?
When it comes to fending off powers that seek to thwart positive change….YES…
If we are talking about high school girls basketball in a small town in the Midwest during the mid-1980s… not always…

The varsity roster had my name on it. I looked again to make sure it was real.
It was.
I immediately felt like it was wrong – that I didn’t belong- that I was undersized and lacked the athleticism and skill to be included on the team. I couldn’t make eye contact with my teammates or talk about it with anyone. I didn’t fit in.
No one else was saying it.
No one else needed to. I was speaking loud and clear in my own brain-
“YOU
DON’T
FIT
IN!!!”

The next day at practice I felt weird going over to the Varsity group.
It was the 1980s in the Midwest. High school (and much of college) girls’ basketball was a game of 6 vs. 6 utilizing a split court play between offense and defense.
(Look it up if this sounds confusing. 😉)

We warmed up and began drills.
Before long, we were scrimmaging.
I spent most of the practice on the sidelines where I believed I belonged.
Coach eventually put me in.
I was on the same team as our top defender. She was good, serious, and intense. I was bad, intimidated, and scared- not what anyone wanted in a freshman on a Varsity roster.
But there I was sharing a court with “M” as her teammate. She stole the ball from the girl she was defending, took two strong dribbles toward the half-court line, and chucked the ball at me.
It was a bullet pass that literally hit me in the gut. I couldn’t handle it. It seemed to partially knock the wind out of me before it sailed down the court and outta bounds.
The disappointment was communicated in silence, except in my own brain.

The next day at school- Coach pulled me aside. He asked me if I knew why I was pulled up to Varsity.
“Because you feel sorry for me…?” Was the response that was only communicated with a shrug while I fought off tears.
“You’re going to be good.” Coach said. “You work hard- and you’ll grow.”
I recognized these self-truths when I heard them. He was right. Embracing these truths changed how I showed up at practice and when I played.

A good defense can only lead to a good offense if I understood what I was trying to defend.

For me- it was self-doubt and negative self-talk that I needed to defend against. They were destroying me and I didn’t realize it.
The adversary was tricky. He was winning the battle of thoughts in my brain and I was the only one who could defend myself against him.
I worked harder to pray for help to think more consistently positive about who I was. Not only as a daughter of God but as a basketball player. And that’s exactly what I identified as truths I needed to defend for!

Everything changed. Like Coach said,
I was going to be good- because I worked so hard. And I became immediately better as I became my own cheerleader and encouraged myself instead of continuing to adopt self-betraying ideas.

What do you need to defend?
What thoughts about yourself serve you well?
What thoughts are lies perpetuated by the adversary to paralyze your progress?
What will change in how you show up if you identify self-truths of being a daughter or son of God and conducting yourself accordingly?

I often wonder why I have to do so much housekeeping in my brain.
There’s a bunch of junk thoughts that don’t serve me well and thus need to be eliminated.

Am I alone here? Or do you have junk thoughts that need housekeeping?

As I continue to work to see myself as God does, I play better defense against the adversary. It seems as though the second I even think about working to improve, the adversary is trying to weaken my resolve and tell me it’ll never work.
Now- I know he’s coming for me- and I work to raise a shield in his direction, committing to defend my position and choice to change.
Better defense leads to positive progression. Telling myself “you’ve got this girl” and believing it is simply a choice.

A good defense can absolutely be the enabler to scoring confidence and the capability to change.

I’m working to more fully show up leaving intimidation and fear behind. They don’t serve me and are absolutely not how God sees me nor how He needs me to show up. I’m accountable to Him -to step up and step out for change. He sends His Spirit and angels to stand with me. As I choose to place my steps of faith toward a teammate of the Savior, I’m strengthened through the enabling power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ to do the work to defend my personal truths.

-JC

Spiced Pumpkin Cookies with Brown Butter Icing

2 cups granulated sugar
½ cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 ½ cups canned pumpkin purée
2 ⅔ cups flour
¾ teaspoon ground cloves
1 ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon nutmeg
¾ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt

Cream sugar with oil. Stir in eggs and pumpkin. Add dry ingredients and stir until well blended. 
Drop a large dollop of sticky dough onto a greased or parchment lined baking sheet. Bake at 375 degrees for 15-17 minutes. Let cool. Glaze with Brown Butter Icing. Let set. Share!

Brown Butter Icing
½ cup butter, browned and cooled
¼ cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Dash of salt 
2 ¾ cups powdered sugar

Heat butter in a saucepan on medium low until it foams and turns brown. Remove from heat and let cool. Combine the remaining ingredients and use a food processor or electric mixer to blend thoroughly.