Rule No. 28 – PROTECT THE LOCKER ROOM
Guard what God is building in you.
Hello Dear Reader,
Welcome back to another week in The Playbook—Rules for Life. I pray this week has given you at least one pocket of space—five minutes in the car, sitting in your train car, or even just a soft release before you headed into that meeting—where you could finally exhale.
In one week, it’ll be Christmas Day. We’re in the homestretch now, winding down to the new year. Some of us have already set our emails to “away,” and in our time off we’re getting our last-minute shopping done. It’s been quite the week. Between year-end deadlines, preparation for church programs, and the messages of “let’s grab a coffee before the year ends,” it’s been a bit hectic.
I’ve also seen many people support me, and Turning Words Into Windows®, by making The Reflection Collection a new addition to their wardrobes. I’m continuously humbled by the support I receive and the ways I’m shown my work matters, my vision matters, and I—Daniel—matter. Not the brand. Not the entrepreneur. Not the educator or writer. But me: Daniel the person. The boy who left Guyana almost nine years ago with a suitcase, a carry-on, and no winter jacket.
This week offered me a few moments to sit and check in with myself. For the last few months, I’ve been in spaces of constant access, where everyone is reachable, everything is shareable, and every moment can be posted in real time. I began to notice that in all of this visibility, something sacred was easy to lose: the hidden spaces where God and I actually work everything out. Where I sit in silence, listening to Suki and Lucy’s water fountain slowly trickle, and I tap in with my innermost thoughts and feelings.
That’s where today’s rule lands:
Rule 28 – PROTECT THE LOCKER ROOM.
Guard the space where you and God actually work this stuff out.
The Lesson
Anyone who has been around sports knows the locker room is its own world. It’s the space where game plans are drawn and redrawn, halftime adjustments are made, honest conversations happen, and frustrations are aired. In it, encouragement is given and roles are clarified. It’s the place where a team’s culture is forged—or fractured. It’s also where the real talks happen.
In my time as an athlete, the locker room held the heated exchanges where my first basketball coach would throw clipboards. It held the moments where my teammates and I either came together to spark a comeback, or reinforced the importance of not letting up and seeing the game through. It held the jubilation after a win, and the thick silence of disappointment—tinged with regret—after a loss.
On the court, the lights are bright. The crowd is loud, and every move is seen, replayed, critiqued, or celebrated. But in the locker room, the cameras are (supposed to be) off. No one outside of the players, coach, and team personnel is allowed access. For me, it was also the place where I sat with myself after everyone left and processed the aftermath of the game.
That’s the main reason the locker room is protected. If it’s unsafe, the team cannot function. If players don’t trust the room, they won’t be honest. If everything shared inside is brought outside, no one will speak freely. And if you allow chaos in that space, it will eventually show up in your performance—and trust me, it will show.
During my tenure as a teacher at All Hallows High School in the Bronx, I also served as the soccer coach for two years. We finished with one winning season and came second in our division. I’ll facetiously take credit and say they had good coaching, but the truth is we had good players and an even better locker room. It wasn’t perfect, but my boys met each other where they were, created space for accountability, and learned to trust and lean on each other. Some days, our locker room was the bus we rode to and from games. In that space, there was no hiding, no shrinking from the truth. Yes, sometimes I was forced to step in when things got too heated, but that’s part of the process.
While we may be tempted to think locker rooms only exist in the sports world, the truth is that spiritually, emotionally, and relationally, you and I have locker rooms too.
For some of us, the “locker room” is our prayer closet. For some, it’s our journal. For others, it’s therapy. It can be the living room of a trusted friend, or that small circle of people who actually know what’s behind the performance. It can be the intimate spaces where we’re away from the noise of the outside world, the crowd of people who rely on us to show up, and the pressures of life. Most importantly, our locker room is our innermost chamber, inside ourselves.
It’s the space where we say the truth of who we are:
The unpolished version of the prayer.
The fear felt before finding the language and posture for faith.
The truth of how angry we are, how tired, how tempted.
It’s the space where we wrestle with God about the call, the delays we face, and the disappointment. It’s where we confront what needs to be changed and chalk up the game plan to effect that change.
For those reasons, we need to protect those spaces. We innately know that we have to, but we often forget that if our locker room is compromised, the whole season is at risk.
Visibility isn’t access.
When the Locker Room goes Public
It’s no secret that we live in an era where everything can become content. Our feeds exemplify this. Private tensions become subtweets. Half-finished revelations become reels. Unprocessed pain becomes a thread for engagement, and how could we forget the ragebait posts? The danger is not that we share. How could it? We were made for testimony and community. The danger, however, comes when we share too early and with the wrong audience:
We post what God is still developing in the darkroom. We workshop our deepest wounds in front of spectators instead of in front of God and the right people. We invite voices into the locker room who do not have the privilege, nor have they earned the right, to be there.
Then, before we know it, our prayer life becomes performance. Our healing becomes a brand. Our process becomes public property, and our journeys become food for public consumption. Through it all, the space where we were meant to be naked before God becomes another stage we’re monologuing from. I have been so guilty of this. Even now I say, ouch.
That’s why my last few months have been about building in silence, sharing only when necessary, which I’ve learned is after it’s happened or never at all.
Protecting the locker room means there are some things you do not live-stream. There are some conversations you do not bring to the group chat. Some wrestlings belong in prayer, in therapy, or with one trusted friend, not in a comment section or shared via repost. Even trusted friends may be unable to coach you or stand with you if they haven’t had the same experiences.
This is not about secrecy for its own sake, or holding cards tight to your chest for control. It’s about stewardship. You are allowed to have a process that is not for public consumption. You are allowed to be mid-wrestle without turning it into content. You are allowed to protect the places where you’re arguing, weeping, confessing, and learning before God.
There’s discernment that’s needed, however, to understand that every room in your life is not a locker room. It’s easy to think so. Some rooms are arenas: work, ministry, social media, leadership spaces. Others are lobbies: casual friendships, professional networks, acquaintances. A few rooms are locker rooms: places of honesty, correction, and safe vulnerability.
The trouble comes when we confuse the categories. That happens when we treat the arena like a locker room and overshare with people who are not equipped to hold it. It happens when we bleed publicly in spaces that are not committed to our healing, only to our performance. Then we’re surprised when strangers mishandle our story, even though we are the ones who handed it to them.
We can also treat our locker room like an arena when we censor ourselves in front of God and the people who could actually help us. We do the same when we give polished answers in therapy, or to trusted friends, even to our partners. Even when we perform strength when we are meant to confess weakness, we turn the locker room into an arena.
You can show the pain in the locker room. Save the performance for the court.
Rule 28 calls us back to the discernment needed to know which room you are in and to protect the room where transformation actually happens.
The Reflection
Admittedly, and it’s probably no secret, I haven’t always protected my locker room well. You, dear reader, see that evidence throughout my rules thus far. There have been seasons where I let too many opinions into the places I was still praying through. I invited voices to critique or celebrate work that was not ready to see the light. I turned my internal wrestle into a public performance because “people needed the message,” even though I was still being taught the lesson. I chuckle as I am writing this, thinking back to some of those moments.
Yet, I’ve also experienced the opposite: sitting in spaces where telling the truth lifted the weight. Sitting at tables with trusted friends where I could share the truth of where I was at, unfiltered, without losing their respect. Sitting with God in the quiet between, praying prayers that have never been posted, and realizing those were the moments changing me, shaping me, and ordering my steps.
Those spaces became my locker rooms, and I began to notice a pattern emerging:
When my locker room was protected, my public work was cleaner, truer, steadier, and more reflective of the vision God gave me. My private life was regulated, and I could show up for myself, my loved ones, and my community in an authentic way.
When my locker room was compromised, my public work got noisier, performance-based, and less rooted. My private life was strained, and I couldn’t even show up for myself, let alone my community.
Protecting the locker room is not just about privacy or access; it is about integrity—alignment between who you are behind the scenes and who you are when the lights are on. It is also about safety. There are things you are not ready to hear or share with anyone. Some corrections need to come from someone who knows the full context. Some wounds require a trained professional, a pastor, or a deeply trusted friend with no ulterior motives, not just a chorus of half-formed opinions or regurgitated social media “wisdom.”
When you protect the locker room, you honor your humanity. You honor your process, and you honor the people God has given you as covering, counsel, and community. Most importantly, you honor God by guarding your heart.
What the Word Says
Scripture has a lot to say about private spaces and guarded places. Jesus teaches us in Matthew 6:6: “But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen.” It’s a closed-door room with your Father who sees in secret, in a sacred space away from spectacle. That’s a spiritual locker room.
The Psalms remind us: “He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.” —Psalm 91:1 (NKJV). There is a secret place. It’s not because God is hiding from us, but because not everything is meant for public view. Protection, covering, and abiding often happen where visibility is lowest.
Proverbs tells us: “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” —Proverbs 4:23. Guarding your heart is not about building impenetrable walls; it’s about spiritual boundary-setting: Who has access? At what level? Under what conditions?
Even Jesus modeled this. He preached to the crowd and then traveled with twelve. Out of the twelve, he had an inner three, Peter, James, and John, who saw moments no one else did. And beyond that, there were moments when he went alone to pray. Not everyone saw every part of him. That was not deception; it was discernment.
The Practice
So, how do we actually live Rule 28 in a world of constant access? Here are a few practical ways to start protecting your locker room.
Do the work in quiet.
Identify your true locker rooms
Ask yourself:
•Where are the spaces I feel safe enough to be completely honest?•Who are the people I can tell the unfiltered version of the story to?
•What practices (prayer, journaling, therapy, spiritual direction) function as my locker room with God?
Name them. Literally write them down. Then thank God for them. Those spaces and people are not accidents; they are provisions.Decide who gets a key
Not everyone gets locker room access. That does not mean people are bad—it means they have different roles in your life.
Ask:
•Who has earned the right to hear the whole story?
•Who has shown they can handle my vulnerability with care, not curiosity?
•Who points me back to God and growth—not just to their own opinions? Let those people all the way in.
At the same time, be honest about who is:
•Arena-only (they see your work, not your wounds).
•Lobby-level (you enjoy them, but you do not entrust them with your deepest process).
That clarity will reduce so much confusion and heartbreak.Keep some things off the feed
Before you post about something deeply personal, ask:
•Have I processed this with God first?
•Have I processed this with a trusted person who knows the full context?
•Am I sharing from a scar, or from an open wound?
If it’s still an open wound, consider keeping it in the locker room a little longer. This does not mean your story isn’t powerful. It means your healing is more important than any content.Tell the truth in the locker room.
A protected locker room is useless if you perform in it. If you are in therapy but only give half-truths, the room is not doing its job. If you are with trusted friends but only share the curated version, you are still in the arena.
Make a quiet commitment:
•“There will be at least one place in my life where I tell the whole truth.”
•“There will be at least one person (and God) who knows what is really going on.”
The locker room is only as powerful as your willingness to be honest inside it. And don’t you deserve that level of honesty?Let God coach you there
Locker rooms are where coaches correct, encourage, and redirect.
Spiritually, that looks like:
•Letting God confront you in private before consequences confront you in public.
•Letting Scripture read you, not just you reading Scripture.
•Being willing to adjust your game plan, how you speak, forgive, rest, and obey based on what God shows you in those quiet spaces.
Ask God this week: “What are You trying to say to me in the locker room right now that I keep drowning out with noise?”
Then give Him space to answer.
Rule No. 28
So here it is, plainly stated: Rule 28 – PROTECT THE LOCKER ROOM.
Guard the space where you and God actually work this stuff out.
Carry the quiet with you.
Remember that not everyone gets access to your process. Not everything God is doing in you needs an audience while it’s still unfolding; a seed grows underground before you see the tree. Your task is not to invite the whole world into your most vulnerable rooms. Instead, your task is to:
Guard your heart.
Guard your secret place with God.
Guard the tables, couches, and offices where your soul is actually being tended.
My prayer is that in this season, God would reveal where your true locker rooms are. He’ll strengthen the walls around those spaces, not to keep love out, but to keep noise out. I pray that He surrounds you with people who can handle your honesty and still call you higher. Finally, I pray that He will meet you in the quiet between with the kind of coaching only He can give.
May you remember that the game is influenced in the arena, but it is often won in the locker room.
Protect it well.
