And just as suddenly as it disappeared— POOF! eRacer X got her MOJO back!

I had a lot of great advice about my recent mental beat-down, lots of encouragement from my team, and one statement that really drove it all home.

“You need an instigator-a shit talker. You need someone to really just piss you off. Not in the throwing punches kind of way, but the ‘gas to the fire’ way.”

That came from a very good friend and one of our officiating staff- one who inexplicably knows me better than I probably know myself and one who is wise beyond reason. She was right. I just needed that extra push to engage the “Dammit, I’m not gonna TAKE this anymore” survival mode. It started with that one extra-determined fight to break the pack in practice, and that had a ripple effect.

All of a sudden, I AM taking that outside corner to out maneuver the last blocker, I AM riding that inside line and holding up against the hits trying to take me down, I’m juking, cutting, weaving, bobbing and I AM breaking through that pack to score.

The fog lifted… that allowed me to resharpen my mental awareness… seeing when to call it off, knowing when to race in the pack, when to stall, where to help. My hits improved, my timing improved, my PLAY overall just did a 180. By far, the most critical and strongest muscle in my body — my BRAIN.

It seems silly now that all these things that are so second nature to me now could be so easily lost in a mental break-down. But they were, and I’m even more hyper-aware that if I can suffer from a case of self-inflicted Mentally Beat Up bruises, then its quite possible that there are many others on my team that may also need the extra assurance.

I’ve always considered myself mentally strong… I can push through pain, I know what it is to give 110% effort and the rewards that come with the exhaustion. In my drag racing career, I depended on my confident ability to stay cool in even the most sudden/life threatening situations. So that mental breakdown? It caught me completely off-guard.

I know the antagonist route that ended my journey isn’t going to have the same effect for most. I’m weird like that… you get me mad, I dig deeper and come back harder. But it makes me very aware that our actions can have a very real and lasting effect on our teammates.

From now on, I’m going to watch my words. I’m going to look for those chances to help and encourage my teammates. I’m going to be the POSITIVE light at the end of the tunnel for someone else in their fog.

Because at the end of the day… we are all in this together.