I remember when I was a kid, my parents liked to discourage my big dreams with their fears and limited thinking. I was always admonished with the old adage “What if it doesn’t happen?” I know that their intention was to keep me grounded in reality, to keep my thoughts realistic, and to shield me from disappointment. But this thinking always seemed so ignorant to me. When I’d heard this advice I always remember thinking, even as a very little kid, “But what if it does happen?”
To me, life is what you make of it. It’s about what you create, not what happens to you. The losers in life catalog their hard knocks and their day to day struggles. The winners keep their focus on the destination. Even if there’s difficulty attaining a large goal, the stuff that happens to you along the way is just part of the adventure. Sure, if we decide to set sail for England from Boston, we might hit some choppy waters. But, who cares? Set sail anyway.
Having a limitation-based philosophy is like driving through life with the brakes on. You’ve got one foot on the gas and one on the brake pedal and wonder why you can’t get anywhere. These type of people are always watching the cars on either side of them concerned someone’s going to cut them off or crash into them. You can spot these people because they’re the ones with fifteen good luck talismans hanging from their rearview mirror, a hundred stuffed animals in the back window, and a trunk full of cones, road flares, and all sorts of emergency garb to bail them out when things go wrong. What if you spent more time thinking about things going right? You just might steer right around trouble to begin with.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m in no way advocating that you drive without a jack, spare tire, and a few other emergency items. I think any adventure worth taking might take you through some potholes making these items indispensable. It’s best to be self-reliant and ready to get back on the road and traveling toward your destination as quickly and smoothly as possible. Quick recovery from setbacks makes you all the less concerned about the next one that may happen. You always have the confidence that “You’ve got this!” All I’m saying is that measuring yourself against others is based on a fear-filled philosophy that causes people to think “What could happen.” “What disaster might lie ahead?“ I say fill your mind with “What will happen” and keep control of the wheel.
I’m a Christian with a definite different interpretation of the Bible. I tend to read the “spirit” of the messages rather than trying to take a literal interpretation. Much of the language in that book is symbolic and is not intended to read like a textbook. I’m sure my mother, God love her, would disagree. Christ said, “You have power enough to say to this mountain be ye lifted up and cast into the sea and it will happen for you if you have faith.” I find it the ultimate in ironies that the people who wanted to fill me with their fears and instill this death philosophy of “realism” are the same ones who were always the most dogmatic and religious. Did they actually read the book from which they were professing to possess infinite knowledge? Faith enough to move mountains? I sure don’t hear any fear or concern about limitation in that statement.
Forge your dreams. Just say fuck it and do it. Don’t waste another day. Start now. Don’t wait for your ship to come in; build the fucker.
