Jan 31

Jan 31 Hustle and Heart: A Kobe Bryant Tribute

by Arza Hammond

I'm no young gun anymore, well into my 30s now. Still feel young though, like I'm just starting to understand what the universe needs from me. Old enough to understand how at 41, Kobe was just entering a new lifetime and ready to give to us what was needed. What is needed now. The game of basketball asked for his hustle, yet somehow, he gave more. He gave his heart. I'm old enough to know that in these times of climate change, the Earth demands my hustle, but that is not enough. Creation needs my heart. I owe it to the Earth to not just hustle, but to give my heart and soul into everything I do.

At the age of 21, I quit my basketball career. Not because I stopped loving the game. Basketball will always be the medium of how I understand Creation and my place in it. But I felt my role had changed. From player to fan to mentor to coach to teaching kids who didn't even care about basketball. I spent a summer at Tomten Farm on a high altitude plateau in Colorado's San Juan mountains. I learned how we come from the soil, how everything we have is a gift from the Earth. Yet at the farm, I couldn't help feel I was a lost soul, looking for what to do with my life now that I had failed at my life...because despite the countless hours I had put into my jumpshot, I hadn't become a D1 player, shit, I was playing D3 ball.

I had decided to move on, milking goats and shifting compost instead of fulfilling my hoop dreams. My only dreams. And yet, just before I left for the farm, Kobe gave a talk...giving it your all, living life pouring your soul out... just like I had done with basketball my whole life... there is no end game. It's the process, the daily living! Learning how to live. To give your whole being into everything you do. The process. The real gift from my hooping days was learning to live such a meaningful life.

Largely because of him, I was able to retire my Jordan's. And to live a life where despite coming short on my hoop dreams, I realized I knew how to give back. Not just back to basketball. Not just back to humanity. But to Creation itself. At the farm I learned reciprocity: the Earth and its beings love us, I must live in a way to love and to give back. The hustle and the heart. The Process!

Thank you Kobe. I never knew you, but I grieve as if I did, as do millions across the world.

Thank you Kobe. The process. Reciprocity. Do not just take. Work as hard as you can. Love the process. Love the work. The struggle is real. The work is real. I am so sad, yet I find so much meaning in it all.

Mamba Out