Learning about overcoming obstacles from watching the Washington Capitals
There it is again. You’ve come so far, but then there’s that familiar old obstacle in your way and the success just stops. We’ve all run into it. Some people call it running into a brick wall. Some people call it hitting a plateau. A certain hockey team calls it the Pittsburgh Penguins.
The Washington Capitals are one of the more successful NHL franchises these past 10 years. They have one of the best players in the league in Alex Ovechkin, and a host of other great players, like Nicklas Backstrom, T.J. Oshie, and Braden Holtby. And yet success in the playoffs has been short-lived. Because of the aforementioned Pittsburgh Penguins.
Three times in the past ten years—twice in the past two years—they have met the Penguins in the playoffs. Each time, the Capitals lost. And each time the Penguins went on to win the Stanley Cup. Talk about salt in the wound.
Here we are in 2018. Guess who the Capitals had to play yet again?
The Capitals got so far, only to bang their heads into the Penguins in 2016 and 2017. Then an offseason, training camp, regular season, and playoffs, and here they are, back again, facing the Penguins. How do the Caps stay motivated? How do they keep believing that this time it will be different?
Because believing is what people who want to win do. They don’t give up. Sure, there are times to feel sorry for yourself, to take the loss on the chin. But then you rise from the proverbial ashes. You surround yourself with teammates, family, friends, and hard work.
I think it comes to something else too…what choice do you have? If you don’t try, you definitely will fail. At least if you give it your best you have a chance.
You could show up at the office with your shoulders shrugged, complaining about the obstacle that keeps defeating you. That obstacle could be anything. It could be that prospect that you can’t close, it could your boss, it could be an employee, it could be the government, it could be traffic, it could be anything. The question is, are you going to get up and try again?
The Washington Capitals kept trying, and this year they beat the Penguins in six games.
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Where are the Washington Capitals now? They just eliminated the Tampa Bay Lightning and are on the way to the Stanley Cup Final where they will face-off against the Vegas Golden Knights.