If It Bleeds It Leads

“If it bleeds it leads” is an old news axiom.  We are culture obsessed with negativity.  Living in the Atlanta area with its horrific traffic, I have learned that we can’t help ourselves but to stop and stare at car accidents. 

The fundamental responsibility of leadership is to properly evaluate reality but I am sick of bad news.  I don’t have my head in the sand but I have temporarily exceeded my patience quotient for negativity.  Maybe it is the season of life I’m in but I want a completely different stimuli coming into life.  

  I mean surely:

• President Obama must be doing something right. 
• The markets have to one day stabilize.
• People still get miraculous physical healing, don’t they?
• Nice guys do finish first, right?
• People of integrity still exist.  I know many.
• Couples still love each other their entire adult lives.  I see much evidence of this.
• Dreams still do come true.
• “Clean” college football programs still exist.  They have to. 

It is the last statement that I will spend some time on.  In the August 23rd edition of Sports Illustrated, Alabama Crimson Tide head coach Nick Saban strongly defends the virtues of college football.

• “Maybe I’m the eternal optimist but I see so many guys who would probably never have gone to college [were it not for football].
• “I’ve seen them graduate and get great jobs.  There are thousands of those stories.”
• Alabama football players did a “tremendous job” helping families and clearing debris from the April tornadoes that ravaged the state.  “But they get no recognition for that” he says.
• Barrett Jones, starting guard for the team, is a 4.0 accounting major who graduated in three years, did mercy missions in Haiti, and was part of the Alabama relief effort.

There is other good news from college football:

• Of Stanford QB and early Heisman front-runner Andrew Luck, Chris Huston says, “He’s got a great back story: a once-and-future first-round NFL draft pick who came back to school to get his degree in architectural design.”
• Landry Jones, QB of the pre-season top-ranked Oklahoma Sooners, is a strong Christian and was involved in mission trips over the summer to Haiti.
• Auburn head coach Gene Chizik’s book All In is a must read for anyone looking for inspirational leadership.
• And I could go on-and-on but living in Georgia you can’t help but look to Mark Richt for what is right in college football.  This past summer Coach Richt took his 3rd missions trip to Honduras as part of World Vision.  Interestingly enough, global missions have only increased Richt’s hunger for success.  “Being on this trip has certainly added to that list of reasons why we want to succeed,” he told the Atlanta Journal Constitution.  As they put it, “It’s a straight-line equation: More winning = longer job life = more money to donate to World Vision.”

To read the entire article detailing Richt’s incredible work with World Vision and his spiritual journey, click here.  You will not be disappointed.

I’m making some changes in my life.  I’m going on a news fast.  No more Fox News.  No more CNN.  I will think the best of people.  I will confess my own sins much quicker.  I will refuse to use sideways energy.  My efforts, intellect, strength, energy, and resources will be directed at advancement and making things better for others.  I will see only the best college football has to offer this fall.

If it bleeds, it no longer leads…at least for me.  What about you?

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