Are You Open To What Life Throws You?
Life has certainly blessed me with diversity. I wear a variety of hats as part of my professional life walk and more often than not these hats realise many fun-filled experiences.
One of these hats allows me to get alongside self-published authors and interview them as part of their self-promotion and every now again…a glimpse of magic comes through, as I wonder how something hasn’t been picked up by a mainstream publisher…and then I’m reminded of life’s journeying stepping-stones.
In this role, anything from fantasy fiction to science fiction to autobiographical fiction to real life stories and inspirational messages of ‘how-to’ and hope; in preparation for each of these interview – I have the privilege of reading their stories. Naturally, some resonate more than others.
It struck me the other day while reading someone’s life story, or as he described – his epitaph…a story of a young man born into an unfortunate family situation on the other side of the world, who at the age of 16 literally threw his hat and a hand full of belongings over the wall, ran away from his family home circumstances and never looked back.
His book went on to detail his life experiences, and they were vast – from those first days of homelessness to making new connections to growing up and gaining credible employment to taking his adventure to the other side of the world to take up a whole new life and add more chapters to his life adventure.
At 16, all this young man knew was that he’d had enough of the life circumstances he was born into and while he didn’t really know the first thing about making life any other way – he had dreams… yes dreams.
As a young boy, he would dare to dream about one day being able to fly and photograph the world from a birds eye perspective – had he shared that dream with those around him, I suspect he may have had that dream ‘knocked’ out of him.
At 16, this young man found the courage to leave the supposed shelter of his family home and make his way in the world. It wasn’t easy and certainly wasn’t glamourous, in fact it was downright terrifying and life luxuries of regular food, shelter and basic cleanliness were rare. That said, he held his course and his nerve and as time passed opportunities crossed his path in various order, and he lived to fulfil the dreams of flight and live a life way beyond his wildest imaginings.
At 16, he made a choice that life was going to be on his terms and of his making.
He hasn’t grown to become a Fortune 500 CEO nor am I about to reveal that I’m talking about some high profile celebrity’s back story…had he chosen to do so, I have no doubt he could have…that said, its quite possible his self-published life story could well be the basis for a movie blockbuster – his story has all the hallmarks, tragedy to triumph, adventure, courage, comedy and romance.
So what struck me?
At 16, this young man (now in his 60s) knew what he was no longer prepared to tolerate and had enough belief in his own ability to go out into the big wide world and make it on his own two feet.
How many 40+ year olds do you know, that would give their eye teeth for this young man’s gumption? Perhaps it’s even that gorgeous person you see in the mirror everyday.
Take a leaf out of our 16 year old runaway’s book and ask yourself a few questions:
What are you tolerating? …and what are you prepared to do about it?
What dreams have you given up on, because someone talked you out of them…recognising that someone might be you.
The good news is – You don’t need to run away from home or take drastic action to breathe life into your dreams.
What’s one thing you can do today, your future self with thank you for?
Bottomline, I don’t know how your life is going to turn out…heck – I don’t how my own life is going to turn out and at 16 the runaway had no idea of how fulfilled his adventurous life was going to unfold either.
Take a chance, dream a little…and remember
If its not fun, its not done
