Dear Kobe…

I don’t doubt the fact that you knew the kind of impact that you had.

I felt like you grew up with me…like we were friends…or even closer: Family.

Because of you, I fell in love with basketball! I always envisioned myself as a shooting guard, at a D1 college…and you didn’t even go to college! Lol!
I had plans…but I didn’t have the same ambition, on the court that you did: That #MAMBA mentality! So, I took notes from YOUR playbook…to be the best at whatever I was passionate about. To be unapologetically relentless about what I loved!

Kobe “Bean” Bryant

“My brain…it cannot process failure. It will not process failure. Because if I sit there and have to face myself and tell myself, ‘You’re a failure’…I think that’s almost worse than death.”

And when I got the devastating news that you had passed away, it caused me to self-reflect. I began to properly put things into perspective, and realize the key ingredient to life (besides Christ).

Confidence.

Confidence to love well. Confidence to lead well. Confidence to BE WELL. Confidence to walk away when it’s the proper time. Confidence to be confident in my purpose.

Your death heightened the death of my own father. I feel like he died all over again. You were his favorite player as well. He would always push me, BOTH on and off the court by saying, “Kobe wouldn’t do that,” whenever I would drop my head for ANY reason. No one knows this outside of my mom, but my dad and I were JUST beginning to work on our relationship when he passed away😔 I had a HORRIBLE habit of allowing silence to come over me and act as though the person didn’t exist whenever I was upset or even disappointed. And each time that happened between my dad and I, YOU were ALWAYS the person to break silence! He would text me, or walk up next to me and start his sentence off the same, every time, “Did you see your boy go off last night?” And when you retired, he had to find another way to “break the ice.” So, he would wear the “What The Kobe” 8’s because he knew how much I LOVED those shoes❤️

Any time you were playing, he would point at the television, and yell, “Momma, there goes that man!” As if to announce that you showed up to WIN! That was his “country expression” that indicated that you were either just getting started in a game, or you were on fire, and no one could stop you!

I miss him and I miss you💔

Thank you for displaying what competing with yourself looks like. For showing the world what daughters’ all around the world NEED: A man that’s PROUD to be the father of a DAUGHTER. A #GIRLdad. Thank you for changing my life! Thank you for being the “olive branch” for my dad and I. I hate that it took me THIS LONG to get this revelation! And I intend to find that same confidence that I admired so much…from this year, until God decides to call me home.

This is tough for me! My heart REALLY hurts! I’ll carry you forever in my heart! #MambaOut

Sincerely,

-SneakHERHead