Shocked to discover that her mouth was now uncomfortably full, she chewed in vain, but it was no use. She choked. Mommy and daddy came to the rescue and extricated the banana from her mouth. To prevent a repeat occurrence, mommy sliced smaller pieces for her. She pushed them away. She had her fill.

Choking changes future behavior.

It’s the fourth quarter, and the Cowboys are poised to take a seemingly insurmountable lead. On the verge of a touchdown, the ball pops from quarterback Tony Romo’s hands. No score. The Cowboys make countless mistakes in the final 10 minutes. They lose by three.

Mistakes lead to more mistakes.

Travel to Flushing Meadows for the 2011 U.S. Open Men’s Semifinals. Roger Federer has taken a commanding two sets to zero lead over Novak Djokovic. One more set to win. Federer crumbles as Djokovic mounts an unrelenting comeback. Crushing victories followed in sets three and four. The final set appears to be headed for extra games, but Federer errs at the end, losing the final set 5-7.

Easing up before the finish opens doors for opponents.

In what many believe will be the last NBA finals for several years, the Miami Heat take a double digit lead into the final minutes of the game. The players jump and scream on the court, celebrating their near-certain victory. Stunningly, this display lights a fire in the Mavericks who reel off an impressive 22-5 run to steal the victory.

Celebrating victory prematurely is foolish.

America’s past-time, 2011. The historically inept Rangers are poised to take their first world series crown over the Cardinals. Two outs, two strikes. One more pitch and a victory for the nine fielders. Unless, of course, that pitch leads to a run. Hours later, players wonder how they let that game get away.

Intense pressure distorts execution.

Choking is a reflexive behavior. Abby choked because she tried to eat too much at once. The Cowboys choked because they feared making more mistakes would cost them the game. Roger Federer choked when he let up before finishing the match. The Heat choked after celebrating their victory instead of finishing the game. The Rangers choked because they let the pressure get to them.

In Abby’s case, well, she’s only one and gets a free pass for choking. For the rest of the evening, she was banana-averse–and for good reason, in her mind it was a dangerous behavior not worth trying again. As a one-year-old, she’s well suited for failure. She quickly forgets and tries again. The next morning, she returned to her normal, banana-loving self. Of course, mommy, daddy, and Abby are all more mindful to prevent this from happening again.

Well-paid athletes don’t get the same luxuries as small children. They are expected to perform under pressure and forget what happened in the past. The Cowboys have been dogged by their mental demons all year. Federer has been in steady decline after losing the edge to Nadal and Djokovic. The Heat came back, won game 3, but then lost the following three to cede the championship to the Mavericks. And so the question is: what will become of the Rangers?

Smart people choke from time to time. It’s inevitable. The foolish ones don’t learn from the past and relive it time and time again. The smart ones learn from the past and change their actions.

Here’s to the chokers.

Click image for larger version.

Kari recently pointed out that every magazine featured her on the cover. This, to me, seems bizarre. It’s almost like a printed shrine to her greatness.

What do you think? Is this a good use of the Oprah brand or is this a little narcissistic?

The importance of one church in one state burning a stack of Qur’an’s is trivial, unless, it relates to a bigger trend. Perhaps that is the underlying assumption of this entire story: Americans have repressed hatred toward Islam, and this is the first of many outbreaks of anti-Islamic sentiment. I doubt it.

To the church in Florida, Dove World Outreach Center: do you think burning a stack of books is helpful? I can assure that printing presses will churn out more books than you can possibly burn. From a functional perspective, you will not win the war. Politically, you sparked a firestorm and brought media attention to your church, but what did you do with it? For an organization that focuses on outreach, how can this be helpful? (Editor’s note: how ironic that the church is named after a symbol of peace, the dove.)

I doubt that burning Qur’an’s will bring people closer to Jesus.

To the media: Why was this such a big story? And where were the editorials decrying the striking lack of fairness? In America, a group threatens to burn the Qur’an. In response, Afghans protested and burned U.S. flags. [Source 1, Source 2] They rioted. They burned U.S. flags. The irony here is that their actions were much more severe, but the U.S. ignored it. Applying their standards in return, the U.S. military would have weeded out the protesters for burning the flag. But we didn’t.

What alarms me the most is that I never read this point. America is great because you can burn books. You can protest and vote. You can say outlandish things. Our freedom of speech is great and something absent in the Islamic world. Say what you will, but our political system is better, even if crazy people get more media coverage than they deserve.

I think He might chastise us for neglecting our neighbors’ poverty until this cataclysmic event.

People in Haiti already led short, painful, and poor lives. The CIA reported the average Haitian life span barely breached 60 years. The populace lives on an less than $4 a day. Most shockingly, the report indicated:

estimates for this country explicitly take into account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS; this can result in lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality, higher death rates, lower population growth rates, and changes in the distribution of population by age and sex than would otherwise be expected.

Like Matt Chandler said before his recent brain surgery, we all die sooner or later. Sickness or catastrophe do not change the inevitable. Undeniably, the suffering in Haiti is acute today. People are hurting. People have died. But the reality is that people there already suffered and died, we just slept more peacefully at night because we did not see their pain.

We are right to help Haiti through their pain. We were wrong to neglect them for so long, and I think that’s what Jesus would tell us.

Q But I want to tell you — and I hope this doesn’t bother you at all — that in the Islamic world they think that President Bush is an enemy of Islam –
THE PRESIDENT: Sure.
Q — that he wants to destroy their religion, what they believe in. Is that in any way true, Mr. President?
THE PRESIDENT: No, it’s not. I’ve heard that, and it just shows [sic] to show a couple of things: One, that the radicals have done a good job of propagandizing. In other words, they’ve spread the word that this really isn’t peaceful people versus radical people or terrorists, this is really about the America not liking Islam.
Well, first of all, I believe in an almighty God, and I believe that all the world, whether they be Muslim, Christian, or any other religion, prays to the same God. That’s what I believe. I believe that Islam is a great religion that preaches peace. And I believe people who murder the innocent to achieve political objectives aren’t religious people, whether they be a Christian who does that — we had a person blow up our — blow up a federal building in Oklahoma City who professed to be a Christian, but that’s not a Christian act to kill innocent people.

Humm… Maybe you’ve read a different Bible than I have…