What if you have an opportunity to do something to get ahead but you will probably fail? What if you have a chance at something you want but taking it may open the door of an undesirable outcome? What if you dare to take risks? What if you dare to challenge life's uncertainties?
William Arthur Ward, one of America's most quoted writers of inspirational maxims, wrote:
To laugh is to risk appearing the fool.
To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.
To reach out to another is to risk involvement.
To expose feelings is to risk exposing your true self.
To place your ideas, your dreams, before a crowd is to risk their loss.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.
To believe is to risk despair.
To try is to risk failure, but risks must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing. The person who risks nothing does nothing, has nothing, is nothing. They may avoid suffering and sorrow, but they cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live. Chained by their attitudes they are slaves; they have forfeited their freedom. Only a person who risks is free.
Taking risks is not an easy choice. It can be both negative and positive. While the faint-hearted focus on the negative side, the strong-willed see the positive angles. What if you dare? If you do, you need to take charge and take control and manage that risk. How convinced and determined are you that this is what you want to do? Is this conviction strong enough to lead you on despite refusal of family members, warning from friends, and ridicule of acquaintances? Is this determination enduring enough to pull yourself up whenever you trip, stumble, and fall? How much effort are you willing to exert to get you through? Will you persist in the midst of obstacles, interferences, and difficulties?
Before you settle with where you are now, think about what you have to bear in your safe and secure life. There you are breathing and feeding but barely living, mostly wishing, randomly wanting. Have you noticed that when everything seems calm, when you are barely struggling in life, you cannot wait for the future to unfold into something that will change the present? In his Stanford Commencement speech in 2005, Steve Jobs said “Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”
The thing is, if you want to be anything, or to go anywhere from where you are, you need to dare and to work hard. You need to get ready to take charge and take control and dare to make your dreams come true!
If you dare to fulfill your dream and people tell you that it is just a waste of time, think of Mark Twain's advice: “Keep away from people who belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.”
What if you dare? You will probably fail but Robert F. Kennedy said “Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.” In his book Tough Times Never Last, But Tough People Do!, Robert Schuller wrote that “Nobody is a total failure if he dares to try to do something worthwhile.” He said that there is no need to fear failure and wrote these inspiring words about failure (in You Can Become the Person You Want To Be):
Failure doesn't mean you are a failure … it does mean you haven’t succeeded yet.
Failure doesn’t mean you have accomplished nothing … it does mean you have learned something.
Failure doesn’t mean you’ve been a fool … it does mean you have a lot of faith.
Failure doesn’t mean you’ve been disgraced … it does mean you were willing to try.
Failure doesn’t mean you don't have it … it does mean you have to do something in a different way.
Failure doesn’t mean you’re inferior … it does mean you’re not perfect.
Failure doesn’t mean you’ve wasted your life … it does mean you have a reason to start afresh.
Failure doesn’t mean you should give up … it does mean you must try harder.
Failure doesn’t mean you’ll never make it … it does mean it will take a little longer.
Failure doesn’t mean God has abandoned you … it does mean God has a better idea!
Robert Schuller also wrote that “People who win over tough times are people who never stop believing. They have faith in themselves and their Lord and in the ideas that God gives them. These winners, survivors, pray for God's guidance and when they know what it is they have to do, then they take action. They do something about it.”
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