Anime Lectio: Blue Lock Seasons One and Two

                                                             1. Why do Anime Lectio? 

Anime Lectio is a time for us to stop and take a breath. Between work, activities, family life, and social media, our minds are always moving. We rarely take time to contemplate and ask, why am I watching this anime? What’s the point of all this? And, how is this making me feel? 

2. Put away all distractions 

(phones, work, etc.)

We are so enslaved to things that stimulate our minds. Let this be a moment for us to free our minds, look inside of ourselves, and be at peace.

3. Deep Breathing

Take several deep breaths. Let your mind relax. If you’ve had any questions, desires, or struggles that you’ve been hiding or stuffing away, let them rise up to the surface. 

4. Open yourself to God’s Presence

Remember God places all our thoughts and desires inside of us, and He uses them to draw us closer to Himself. God gives us a community to help us understand who we are and what He is calling us to do. The faces of other people you know and don't know are like signs of God’s presence.  

5. Think About What’s on Your Mind in Relation to the Anime

Think about what’s been on your mind in relation to the anime.  The following is an example of such thoughts written by me.  

It's important to be part of a team, or something like a community, both as a participant and as an individual member.  As a participant in this team, contributing what you can do and having others help you with what you can't do is important since no single person can do everything on their own.  As an individual member in this team, doing what you want or need to do without the team is also important, but it's not everything.  But what if you thought that this was everything?  An interesting answer to this question can be seen in the first and second seasons of the anime series Blue Lock.

6. Brief and written explanation of the anime

Pay attention to how the brief and written explanation of the anime seen on this blog, or seeing the anime for yourself since that's better than any explanation, might “speak” to you or shed light on the things that have been on your minds.

The anime series Blue Lock is a soccer anime where the best high school soccer players are invited to a soccer training facility where only one of them can become the best of the best. After losing an important match with his team due to not taking what he thought could have been the winning shot himself, the main character decides that he has to try to become the best of the best in order to improve, which is most likely what everyone invited thinks too. After a series of bizarre training exercises, which mostly involve groups working together, fewer end up making it to a certain point. Due to adults involved in promoting soccer in Japan wondering whether this training facility is worth it or not and after arguing about that with the man running the facility, they agree on a decision. The decision is that the ones who are left have to create a team to face the official U-19 team of Japan in order to decide what happens with a soccer match, which is what the first season ends with and is seen in the second season with the Blue Lock team winning.

7.  Reflect on the anime

Has this brief and written explanation of the anime shed any light on what's been on your minds?  The following is an example of a reflection on the anime from me.

Blue Lock is actually the first soccer anime I've ever seen and what it does is different from other soccer anime, which is why Blue Lock is the first soccer anime I've ever seen (also why I kept watching it despite criticism of the second seasons animation - didn't see the problems or care). While other soccer anime focus on the importance of being a participant in a team and helping each other all of the time, Blue Lock doesn't exactly do that. People helping each other does happen, but it happens because it's forced. Becoming the best of the best requires getting help from others in order for this to happen, so helping others does happen, but only with helping yourself in mind. This way of thinking has to do with the ego, which is basically an "it's all about me" mentality and is also enforced by the fact that the man running the Blue Lock facility is known as Ego. Ego is important in being your best, but being your best isn't always something that you can do on your own. Being your best may be possible when you are with the right people. Understanding your ego is how you can understand what you want.

8. Final Prayer

Please voice any prayer intentions for friends, family, or people around the world that relate to this anime.  The following is an example written by me.

Let us pray that we can understand our own ego and what we want as a result of what it wants.