Stalled in my writing one afternoon, I pealed my hands away from the keyboard, abandoned my perch in the home office and went to see what my kids were up to.

“Dad, don’t step on my baby,” Novi squealed as I walked across the kitchen to grab a glass of water. I glanced at my feet. My writers’ block was instantly cured.

Lo and behold, I’d come within inches of crushing a precious purple pipe cleaner shaped into a circle. Little did I know, this object — sitting unprotected in the middle of the high-traffic hardwood pathway — was actually a very special creation. It had a personality. A life story, even.

While I’d been self-righteously avoiding AI for lede-generation purposes, my 4-year-old and her little sister, Ella, had productively spent their morning art project time tripling an already excessive baby population. Before me were named pipe cleaner babies strewn across the living room, jammed into their yet-to-be-born baby brother’s bouncer, and laying under the couch and on top of the table.

“I’m sorry,” I said to Novi, whose eyes gifted me with this blog post.

Novi’s affectionate concern for her craft — (cough) baby — synthesized for me the interconnected nature of a pair of books on the mental side of sports, Mikaela Shiffrin’s new podcast an old Joe Rogan one, the abortion debate, my athletic journey ….and a kids book we’ve read a couple times recently by Max Lucado titled “You Are Special.”

Let’s start there.

Lucado’s book follows a young ‘wemmick’ named Punchinello. Punchinello struggles with how his fellow wooden people — who denote the despised members of society with dotted stickers and those worthy of praise with stars — evaluate him. One day, he meets a wemmick who mysteriously isn’t plastered head-to-toe with dots or stars. Punchinello discovers the opinions of others don’t stick to her because she’s realized the actual source of her worth: the ‘Creator,’ a woodcarver named Eli.

At the end of the book, Punchinello meets Eli.

“Remember,” Eli said as the Wemmick walked out the door,

“you are special because I made you. And I don’t make mistakes.”

Similar to Punchinello and Novi’s little pipe cleaner child, the words of the Psalmist anchor our worth in something truly spectacular when you really think about it.

(And admittedly, I’ve probably been thinking about it more than most with my wife carrying our third child in the womb for the last 9 months before giving birth three weeks ago).

For you created my inmost being;

you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

I praise you because I’m fearfully and wonderfully made;

your works are wonderful,

I know that full well.

Psalm 139:13-14

Tim Tebow never would have become the first sophomore to win the Heisman Trophy if his mom had listened to doctors’ recommendations to abort her fifth child. Instead, she trusted in God, who ‘knit’ young Tim together in her womb. In a conversation with Jordan B. Peterson, Tim Tebow pointed out how even the lowest, sickest, most forgotten and lowly in the eyes of the world are “one of one” in the eyes of their Creator.

I can’t stop thinking about that phrase: “one of one.” If I’m feeling down, I just say it to myself.

If Novi loves her pipe cleaner baby — and has decreed a story for their life — try to imagine God’s care, design, intent and affection for you? Perhaps my daughter’s natural tendency to create and then care for these imaginary beings is a feature embedded in us all, evidence of being made in God’s image. That’s probably a rabbit trail for another day.

So, what does the Psalmists’ words of security mean for athletes?

Are we “good enough” just the way we are?

If we are, what about this whole ‘keep on striving’ mantra?