Now have you ever wondered what it means to be the best in the world?
Now I'm sure this is a question that most of us have asked ourselves before.
You know, maybe you're not sure what it means to be the best, how to get to be the best,
and all the steps in between and how to get there.
Well, you know, ask no longer because today I'm going to answer that for you with a little
help from an anime whose essentially its whole premise is based on the question of being
the best.
And that anime is called Blue Lock.
What's going on guys?
My name is Nate, your host, and you're listening to the Otaku Liberation.
This is a show where we help you break free from the chains that are holding you back
in your life by connecting some biblical principles with themes from your favorite anime.
Now again, right now this is going to be my little spoiler warning for all my anime only
listeners out there that I will be covering just a little bit of stuff from the manga.
Not too much, don't worry.
But again, I make sure I put the spoiler out there just so everyone's aware.
Alright, so let's get into it.
So Blue Lock.
What is Blue Lock?
Well, Blue Lock is a series, and again, kind of disclaimer here, I'm going to butcher all
of these names so please, please forgive me.
But Blue Lock is a series written by Munoyuki Kaneshiro and illustrated by Yusuke Nomura.
And essentially, the long and the short of it is, the series is about this guy named
Ego Jimpachi who's over at Blue Lock.
He's the one who created the facility and basically the storyline.
He wants to create the best egotistical striker in the world to play for Japan's national
team.
And I set the stage at the context of it, this is right after the 2018 World Cup, and
Ego wants to fix the problem with Japanese soccer, you know, whether it's just holding
them back and preventing them from winning the World Cup essentially.
Because at this point in time, Japan has yet to win a World Cup and he believes that having
specifically an egotistical striker, one who wants to score goals at no matter what the
cost, no matter what, and basically, unless the team's not winning through their goals
then they don't want to play type thing.
And it's an interesting concept, I mean that's what drew me to the anime in the first place,
it's a very interesting concept.
So once I started watching it and eventually read the manga, I really love how it breaks
down the concept of A, what does it mean to be the best?
And B, how do you get there?
What is it that you bring, basically what do you bring to become the best, to be the
best?
And again, it kind of parallels to, from a biblical standpoint, from God, it's like,
okay, how do we live up to God's expectation for us?
How do we live up to the vision that he envisioned when he made us, right?
How do we live up to, essentially solve the problem that he created us for?
And when I was doing my study for this episode, I really, it honestly kind of scared how a
lot of these kind of parallel.
So for this episode, I got three points that I kind of want to go over and it goes in sequence.
So the first point I'm going to go over is discovery.
And what I mean by that is discovering your weapon, discovering your gift, your talent.
And I say weapon because that's how ego refers to the blue lockers, the players, to their,
what it helps them score essentially.
And that's what their weapon is.
And within the anime, there's all various characters, all very different, and there's
also very, very different type of weapons.
And we got one guy who's an instinctual dribbler.
He doesn't really come up with any fancy footwork that gets calculated.
Just whatever his heart feels in the moment is what he does.
You got one guy whose spatial awareness is on point where he can essentially see the
whole field almost as if he's standing above it.
And you got another guy whose first touch is immaculate.
If the ball is coming to him, he can take it down in any, which way possible and very
unpredictable and just more and others like that.
But essentially what ego wants the blue lockers to do is to discover their weapon.
What is it that makes them special, makes them unique and what helps them to score goals.
And that really spoke to me because again, it's the same thing with them, with the guy,
because we all have different gifts and talents that we were blessed with.
They were put in us for a particular work, particular goal in mind.
And even though that's within us since birth, it's up to us to pursue and discover it.
And I think that's, I know that's something that people may not really understand all
the time.
It's okay.
If God put this in me, then I should just know what it is, right?
Yes and no.
When you first start to really reflect and just start doing self work, you'll know.
I'm sure right now you're thinking about something like, okay, and I know I'm pretty good at
this and pretty good at that.
I can do things.
And that's another thing.
Just because you're good at something doesn't necessarily mean it's your gift.
And just because it's your gift, that means that's the only thing you can be good at.
And I think, again, this is just kind of me personally, at least in my life, that you
will know what your gift, what your talent is, because there will be a peace that comes
with it.
It'll, no matter what, it won't feel like work.
It'll feel like purpose, right?
And what I mean by that is, I'll use myself for example, in terms of what it feels like
to do work.
And I do IT stuff on, you know, from my day job and on the side sometimes.
And I'm good at it, but I've had to work at it as well.
And there's been ups and downs and some joys and a lot of headaches that come with it.
And I don't know if that's really my gift per se, but I know that's something I'm good
at because I've worked hard to improve it.
Whereas I feel like your gift would be something that just comes naturally to you.
It comes naturally and it doesn't feel, it feels, I'm not going to say effortless, but
I can't think of a better word for it, but it just, it feels like, it's almost like a
flowing river, right?
You're not going against the current, trying to get better at it.
You just kind of, it kind of goes, it comes to you naturally and you just build on that.
You build on that momentum.
And essentially that's what it is, what it means to discover your weapon, your gift is
to really, honestly play around with it.
Play around with the different things, different interests that pop up for you.
You know, if you want to learn to play an instrument, go play an instrument.
You're going to learn how to cook, right?
Or a particular workout, particular sport, try comedy and whatever it is that piques
your interest that you think, okay, this may be it.
Go out and do it.
Because if you don't, you won't ever know if that, if that was the thing that God put
you on this earth for, that was the thing he put in your spirit.
If you're too afraid to even try it, right?
So discovery is, can be the most nerve wracking and it can also be the most fun.
Yeah, you can discover a lot about yourself and you can really discover what isn't your
gift, right?
I know for a fact, my gift is not sinking whatsoever.
I can't carry a tune at all and I'm not going to try to.
And no, I'm not going to do it on this episode either or any episode.
So don't even ask.
But if I never wanted to even explore that option, I would have never known.
And the worst regret that people have isn't that they failed at something.
It's typically because they never tried.
And I just want to encourage everyone out there today just to try, see what sticks and
what doesn't and just have fun with it because it's not nothing in the world.
And the way Eagle describes it to the Blue Lockers is to have to turn zero into one.
How do you go from the very beginning and to turn it into something, into a goal here
in the literal sense, but in the sense of our gifts and talents, how to turn it into
a goal, something that we can strive for.
So I mean, so that's the first point is discovery, discovering your weapon, your gift, your talent,
whatever you want to call it, and really finding out what it is.
And so that's first step.
The next step is we got put down as evolving or evolution, essentially evolving your weapon
or you want to put another terms refining your gifts and talents.
And essentially is that, OK, so let's say you found out what your gift is or you have
an idea of what it is and now what?
So now we had to go through the refinement process and really, really trimming out the
fat and really putting it through its paces to see how far can you take this thing.
And again, if it's from God, it's going to go way beyond what you think it will.
But essentially is like, OK, so I had this thing.
So let's say, OK, let's go back to the singing example.
So let's say for for argument sake, singing was my is my gift.
I know the first fat is my gift.
That's what God put on me.
So what do I do now?
How do I refine this?
OK, that may be, you know, going to a vocal coach or a couple of vocal coaches, right,
to teach you how to really control your voice and the muscles like in your windpipe and
things like that.
Again, I'm just kind of spitballing here.
I don't think I'm not a singer, so I'm not sure.
If you are, feel free to correct me and tell me what the actual process is.
But you know, if you guys you guys may get the idea right or say, let's say you say you
have a naturally athletic body, right?
You pick up on things really, really fast in terms of anything physical, whether it's
playing soccer, playing football, baseball, just working out gymnastics, martial arts.
Let's say you pick up on things really quick and the refinement could be just doing the
practices, doing the drills and things and really focusing in on that aspect on.
OK, so, you know, say I've learned this new drill, this new pass here.
Let me keep practicing, keep drilling, keep going over and over and over again with the
repetition.
And each time you do it, you're going to get better and better and better and better at
it.
And in regards to the Blue Lock and how they go about it, ego stresses them to do just
that, find their what he calls their formulas.
And the formulas are key part to being successful in terms of being a striker for them, because
it takes their gifts and it takes the takes their gifts that they discover and takes how
they apply it to turn it from zero to one.
And now they have to replicate it.
Now they had to be able to do it over and over and over again, because the first time
is a miracle.
And everything after that is actual skill.
And that's me getting the same thing is just really taking that gift and putting it through
his paces, finding out your formula, finding out what works for you and for what's out
for you specifically.
Because again, a lot of people that can have similar gifts and there may be similar gifts
and talents.
But the truth is how you apply them is very, is very different and unique to you.
And it can be different for somebody else.
So it's up to you to again, continue that self work, continue that discovery, but also
figure out, okay, how can I hone this?
How can I get better at it?
How can I make it my own essentially?
And I'd say I can't explain useful.
One of the characters, he, he, the main character, Yoichi Sagi, he, again, his gift of spatial
awareness, right?
So he can see the field and the position of the players and kind of almost predict how
plays are gonna, are plays are gonna happen, right?
And so he used that to position himself in opportune spots where he figured the ball
was gonna go.
So that way he can get it and potentially score, right?
So I mean, that's what, that's his gift.
The second thing he had to add to it was his direct shot, which is how he shoots the ball
on goal, right?
And his direction is basically if a pass or a ball is in his vicinity, he doesn't try
to take it down into recent or anything like that.
He just, he just shoots as accurate as he possibly can get.
And so that's two pieces of his formula, right?
It's his spatial awareness slash positioning and then his direct shot.
So combining those two things allowed him to create goals repeatedly.
And again, that's the whole thing of evolving your weapon to the point where you can use
it subconsciously repeatedly and just refine it with little minor tweaks and things like
that over and over and over again.
And I mean, yeah, it's pretty much in it.
Is it going to be hard?
Yes.
Because anything worth having is going to require hard work, right?
Especially when you're trying to get to the point where you want to be the best of the
best of whatever it is that you decided to do and to really take it to that next level,
it's going to be hard.
It's going to be hard and hard work, but the fulfillment you're going to have during the
hard work and especially after is nothing to laugh at because at that point you really
do feel fulfilled.
And honestly, I think it's something that we all strive for, whether we know it or not,
it's just to be fulfilled in our lives.
So yeah, so again, the first thing was discovery, discovering your gift, your talent, your weapon
as Bluedock puts it.
Second thing is evolving that weapon, gift or talent.
The third thing I want to go over is using that weapon, gift or talent and really how
to use it for yourself and for others.
And I really want to kind of harp on that piece a little bit because in Bluedock, well,
yeah, Bluedock really puts the idea of soccer on its head because as most of us know, soccer
is a team sport.
You know, 11 guys on the pitch, 11, the biggest 11 and it's all for the common goal of literally
scoring goals and to beat the opposition, right?
So you got different positions, different players are good at different things and they
work together in order to, you know, to win.
And Bluedock, it's no, none of that.
You're there to score goals and that's it.
You don't care about what no one else is doing.
Your job is to score goals and all you care about because that's the mindset that they
have to have in there.
It's a doggy dog type of world.
And in doing that, they, funny enough, funny enough, in doing that, by only focusing on
themselves, they inadvertently help the other guys by winning, right?
Because in this, in the series, you know, losers are kicked out of Bluedock and then
they're pretty much their future prospects to soccer are destroyed more or less.
You know, again, without going into too much detail about the story and things like that,
essentially what happens.
So losing is a very real thing for them.
So that's why they strive to win.
And some people sacrifice, they do sacrifice their pride in order to support others because
again, it doesn't matter if you score all the goals in the world, if your team loses.
So but in doing that, that doesn't mean you can't neglect yourself and your own weapons
and talents in order to just boost up somebody else.
So that's where you got to find that balance to be able to use your gift and your talent
for yourself, for yourself and your fulfillment and peace and then to pursue the, essentially
the path that God put out for you.
But you also had to figure out how to use it for others because we ask what the Lord
will does.
He wants us, he doesn't, everything that he gives us isn't just for us, right?
And I mean, I know that's, it's a novel concept to really think about, but every day that
he blesses us with isn't necessarily for us.
It may be just be there for us to hold and to give to somebody else who may need it further
down the line.
And the same thing for our gifts and talents.
I mean, yes, it's going to benefit us because it's ours.
I mean, we're stewarding over from him and he wants us to use it and to prosper and to
be successful with it.
But at the same time, he wants us to reach out to others, to reach out and is, you know,
to be a blessing in however that may look like, right?
And not just that, but also to work together, you know, to work together for, you know,
a greater purpose, for something that's beyond yourself.
And I think that's where the real peace aspect comes from is when you're working with something
beyond yourself as you were at peace.
And I'm sure parents understand that a hundred percent, right?
Because before when you're first of all, obviously when you're single, whatever, it's pretty
much just you trying to figure out, make your own way.
Then you may get together to get married and it's okay.
Now it's me and this other person and we got to figure out how to make this dynamic work.
And then you add kids in the mix.
So now we got to make sure that me as an individual is good.
Me with my spouse is good and how we, how we work together.
And now we got kids in the mix and make sure, okay, like myself, my spouse, and then, and
my kids as well.
And of course, above all, it makes your relationship with God is right.
God is the foundational piece for all of this, right?
So keep that in mind.
But you see how we start adding more people gets a little more complicated.
That's why it's important that, you know, in my mind that you, that you are right.
You're right with the Lord.
You're right in your purpose and, and you're confident in your, in your, just, just, just
in yourself, right?
To make sure you know who you are in him.
That way you can stay true to yourself no matter who else is involved in your life.
And it's easy, very, very, very easy to get lost in that.
Because if you have a, if you have a big heart, a bleeding heart, you know, if you really
care about other people, you sometimes may put their needs above your own to a detriment.
I mean, you're, you're given and given and given and given, but no one's giving back
into you, right?
So it's important to find that, find that type of balance in all aspects of your life.
Make sure you make sure you're good first.
And then, then, then you can pour out into many people as you want.
Cause the way I like to think about it is the, the, like if you're on an airplane, right?
When they're explaining to you how to put on the oxygen mask in the case of emergency,
they'll drop down and you got to, they always tell you to put your mask on first before
you help somebody else.
And the reason is you, you passing out trying to help somebody else before you finish helping
them, is it going to help either one of you, right?
So make sure your mask is on first.
Make sure you got good air coming in into your lungs so you can help other people.
And I know for me, that was, that was a lesson I had to learn, you know, honestly, relatively
recently is just to make sure that you're okay first.
Not necessarily be selfish or self-centered, but you have to be okay before you can truly
help somebody else to the best of your ability.
And just saying that, kind of going back to your talents and your gifts, you know, hone
it, learn from it and learn more about yourself while you're practicing with these things.
And like I said, just have fun with it.
Figure out what you can do with this gift and then how you can apply it to your own
life and to other people's lives and how you can work together with other people in order
to make something even greater, right?
And honestly, the scripture that kind of ties all of this together, it was a couple of scriptures,
but kind of say the same thing is in, you know, first Corinthians chapter 12 verses
four through seven.
And this is in regards to the spiritual gifts that God's given us.
Again, this is in the CSB version, the Christian Bible version, because I don't speak the
yield English.
That's just not my style.
But in the first four, it says, now there are different gifts, but the same spirit.
There are different ministries, but the same Lord.
And there are different activities, but the same guy produces each gift in each person.
A manifestation of the spirit is given to each person for the common good.
So again, it says really just reiterating that we are all blessed with different gifts
from from the same guy, from the same spirit.
And these gifts may look nothing alike, but they all have a common goal within the common
good for the kingdom and reaching out and just really doing what you can to help help
the next person.
Right.
And again, that's really, really what it's all about.
It's kind of ironic that I've chosen to use Blue Lock as this example, because the whole
premise of the show is me, me, me.
I'm the best.
I'm the king of the world.
It's either me or nothing else.
But if you think about it, even if they have that mindset, they can't help but help somebody
else because without without somebody else helping them, then they're liable to lose
everything themselves.
So even even the most selfish, the most self-centered person can inadvertently be a blessing to
help help somebody else.
And I don't know.
I don't know if it's just me.
I just think that's kind of funny to think about.
But but yeah.
So again, just kind of recap is, you know, discover your weapon, your talent, gift, whatever
you want to call it.
Really spend some time exploring different things that you may be interested in.
Second is evolve it or refine it.
Really trim the fat and really get to know it intimately and see what works for you and
how you can improve on it.
And you ask God, ask the Holy Spirit to guide you because it came from him.
So who better else who better has to know what to do with it than him.
Right.
So that's how how basically how you can use it to the best of your ability and to maximize
its potential.
And then thirdly is is to actually use it right.
Use it.
Figure out how you can use it to betterment the path that he set you on and then figure
out how you can combine it with others in order to get to the ultimate goal that he
set out.
We just come together for the good, the good of everybody, essentially.
So yeah, again, I just want to thank you guys for tuning in to today's episode.
I pray that you got what you needed out of it and that you learn something new about
yourself.
And if you haven't, did you go back and learn something new about yourself?
Right.
Again, feel free to subscribe to the podcast and leave a review.
I would love, love, love to read you guys review and comments because I'll take those
to heart and honestly strive to improve each and every episode and get better and better
at this.
So that way I'm delivering the value that you guys, you know, that you guys need out
of it.
And yeah, that's pretty much it.
And I just want you guys to always remember you are the main character of your story and
that story doesn't end till he says so.
All right.
See you next time guys.