Degree of difficulty

If you're feeling especially curious, visit the USA Diving website, head to their Judging and Scoring section, and teach yourself how judges score dives. It's pretty complicated. It's pretty fascinating. There's a half-point increment that takes you from 0 up to 10, and judges evaluate several components of an individual dive. The approach, the takeoff, the elevation, the execution, the entry. You have a certain number of judges. You have scores that are eliminated, the highest and the lowest. You have the degree of difficulty rating.

The degree of difficulty is especially intriguing to me. The way the judges spell it out, or the way the website spells it out, is that the total is multiplied by the predetermined degree of difficulty rating associated with the particular dive performed to calculate the diver's overall score. Degree of difficulty ratings range from 1.2 to 4.1 in one-tenth increments.

Now, I'm not fascinated necessarily with diving, but I am fascinated with this concept of degree of difficulty. I heard two speakers this past weekend just happen to speak about this concept, or incorporate the concept of degree of difficulty in their talks. It wasn't planned. And I find it fascinating, because so much of our lives is spent in constant comparison.

We look at other people's lives, and we see the life they're living on the outside, and we compare. Maybe we compare with a harsh judgment of the things they should be doing. They need more tough love. They need more of this. They need to be doing that. They should have made this choice. They should have made that.

Maybe sometimes we judge and we're too hard on ourselves. They've got it all. Look at all the happiness. Look at all the money. Look at all the joy. And look at my life. Look at the loneliness. Look at the setbacks, the adversity. We're really hard on ourselves, or maybe we're really hard on others. And at no point in time do we take in consideration this concept of degree of difficulty.

Now, if you believe in a patient, tolerant, loving Heavenly Father, maybe you believe that when your judgment comes, the degree of difficulty will be applied to your life. A deal of mercy. But whether you believe in that or not, maybe we could think of this with regard to the treatment we apply to each other, the judgments we apply to each other.

There’s something to be said for somebody who can apply an ounce of grace with just about every encounter they have with others. An ounce of grace, an ounce of curiosity, an ounce of patience, an ounce of tolerance.

It doesn't mean you have to agree with the decisions that somebody else has made. It doesn't mean you have to endorse other lifestyles or choices. It just means that you're striving for common ground. You're striving for a bond with other people. You're striving for a lack of judgment and a little bit more calm in your relationships.

I love this idea of degree of difficulty and what it means for how we can approach our relationships, giving people just a little bit of space, giving people just a little room, a little mercy. I think I could do a little bit more of this in my life. How about you?