My dictionary tells me that to risk is “to expose oneself to the chance of loss.” I suppose that is true. Another piece of literature I was once given (author unknown) suggests that:
To laugh is to risk appearing the fool. To try is to risk failure. To weep is to risk appearing sentimental. To reach out for 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 hope is to risk despair.
You may avoid suffering and sorrow if you don’t risk, but you simply cannot learn, feel, change,grow, love, live. The greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing. The person who risks nothing, does
nothing and has nothing. Only a person who risks is free. What causes individuals to shy away from taking a risk, even if it is a low risk and will give them
something they really want? Well, certainly high on most people’s list would be fear of loss,failure and perceived humiliation if the loss were to occur. Why would we automatically think that
we would fail at something? Why wouldn’t we first try and see, and then if we did fail, learn from that experience and move on?
I believe it dates back to our little life. And, since risk-taking, to my knowledge, is not a subject that is taught in school, it would lead me to believe that a person’s fear of taking risks might stem back from before they can even remember. When you were a child taking your very first steps, it wasn’t uncommon to hear one of your parents or guardians say, “Be careful, you might
fall.” Or, “Don’t do that, you’ll ….” Though some of this is rhetoric and you don’t really pay much attention to it, for some, it begins the pattern of playing it safe.
Think of how much better equipped we would be to face life’s challenges and succeed, if we had repetitively heard, “Take a chance and don’t worry about falling, because you’re going to fall …
probably quite often. Falling is an important part of learning.” Many of the greatest lessons you’ll receive in life are going to come from falling … from your failures.
Failing will never make you a failure unless you quit. I have often said that a little baby is a natural born risk taker. The baby never considers the consequences of falling when it is learning to walk.
Falling is acknowledged as a natural consequence to learning to walk.
Why is it that we do not see the process of reaching our goals as having steps similar to the ones the
baby must take in order to learn to walk? There will be some stumbling and falling in the learning process, but success can only be reached when we are prepared to take those steps, all of them,
even the ones where we may fall down.
While we’re still on the topic of children, I’ll throw up another caution flag. There’s a four letter
word that most parents use around their children so frequently, that the children pick it up and before too long it is buried in the treasury of their sub-conscious mind. That four letter word is
CAN’T. This word has done more damage than a lot of other frowned-upon four letter words put together. I know of some forward-thinking parents who have literally banned that word from their
children’s vocabulary! Can’t is a word that paralyzes any constructive progress. It switches your mind into a negative frequency.
practical reasons which will enable you to justify why you are not able to do something you sincerely want to accomplish. The only alternative to that four-letter word is its polar opposite – I CAN.
I can is far more important than IQ. You don’t necessarily have to be very smart to win … but you must be willing. Reaching the goal is not success; success is moving toward the goal. Taking risks is essential when you want to reach a goal and the purpose of goals is growth. When you challenge yourself, you bring more of yourself to the surface. If you dream of living your life in a really big way, you must accept risk-taking as a very real part
of the apprenticeship you must serve. Make a decision right now to change. Decide this very moment there will be no more playing it safe … no more “saving it for a rainy day” type thinking
in your life. When people get caught up in the habit of saving for a rainy day, that is generally what they get … a rainy day. Somebody was telling me a story about a farmer
who was out walking in a field. He looked down and saw a tiny pumpkin growing on a vine. Nearby, he spotted a small glass jar. The farmer reached down and placed the tiny pumpkin inside
the small jar. The pumpkin continued to grow until it filled the inside of the jar. Beyond which it could not grow. There are a number of people like that tiny pumpkin. They limit themselves and refuse to take a
risk. They never truly test the strength of their abilities. You will never get to second base if you keep one foot on first. Too many people go through their entire lives playing their cards close to
their chest. They never step out and bet on the surest thing in the world … themselves. If you hope to accumulate great wealth or achieve high goals, history records that the first few steps
have a high degree of risk. You must turn your back on safety and security. To make it big, you must take big risks. You will very likely have to put yourself in a highly vulnerable position. It is
also worth remembering you cannot almost take a risk. Eleanor Roosevelt said, “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which
you really stop to look fear in the face.” Follow her advice and liberate yourself from the crippling emotional state of fear and enter into a world of freedom.
