The Arena.
I’ve dreamt of this place
What it would look like
Feel like
Smell like
I’ve dreamt of making it into this arena
This empty arena
In which one of the greatest battles
Will be fought in front of an audience of none
I entered 2 days ago
Feeling the crunch of gravel under my feet
Smelling the musty air
From battles of old
From failures of past
From mistakes made by others
With dreams that failed to last
I’ve made it to this place
To fight the battle I knew I could fight
But before, never quite believed
I would come out on the other side
And there it stands across from me
Looming
Impending
Dominating
Fierce
Eyes as black as night
Ready to destroy me
As it did so many times before
This creature
Built from all of my fears, doubts, and failures
Larger and stronger than ever
I’ve seen it pass over me before
I’ve seen what it’s capable of
I’ve known how it doesn’t have to fight me physically
But can instead infect my mind
And destroy me from the inside out
And yet there’s something much different about this day
Meeting it here in the arena
The place where men come to live or die
There’s something different in the air
There’s a tension
Not from my side, but from the other
It can sense it
It knows I’ve never been here before
But it knows that in my mind, I’ve been here for years
Fighting to get to this place
Preparing
Sweating
Toiling
Developing
So when the day came
The day I would be judged
I would come forth as a built man
One who created himself with his own hands
And unshackled his life from the chains of old
Knowing I had one fight left
One last attack
To finish it off
And I knew
That this was the only chance I would ever get
To face it like this in the arena
That empty arena
I hear the tip of his sword dragging on the ground
And I know this is my one shot
To break free
To defeat
To conquer what seemed so unconquerable
The battle for my life is here
This is the moment
It can only be seized
Here’s my charge.
Evan Sanders
The Better Man Project