Risks

It was American author Erica Jong who said, “If you don’t risk everything, you risk more.”

How true is this statement!?! We are all faced with difficult choices to make. Some of those choices involve taking great risks. Most people tend to take the easy way out. They choose the option with the least amount of risk involved and usually end up sitting around accomplishing very little. In my experience the options with the biggest risk factor also have the biggest rewards. If we are not risking everything we have, we are risking everything else!

When we are willing to lose big if things don’t work out it frees us to be able to gain greater things than we could ever lose. By never taking a chance we lose out on experiences we would not have had otherwise. I experience this every day of my life. With my health the way it is most things I do are pretty risky for me. There are a million ways I could get hurt or have things go wrong every time I leave the house. I could pass out in a parking lot walking into the grocery store and get run over. I could pass out walking down some stairs and break my neck. I could go on, but I’ll spare you the details. The point I’m trying to make is that with my illness everything I do involves some sort of risk, but if I never did any of it I would spend my entire life sitting on the couch. Many people think that I should stop taking these risks and just live in a little bubble, but for me that would not be life. Yes, I risk a lot and I've paid the price for it at times, but more often than not by taking the risk and getting out I am able to enjoy life more fully. I am able to be independent, and keep a sense of normalcy to life.

Right now I am contemplating a decision that has a lot of pro's and con's. Each list contains important factors making the decision fairly difficult to make. As I ponder over my situation I look at the picture above and imagine that fish swimming circles around his little fish bowl saying, "Should I do it? Should I not do it? It could work out to be wonderful, or it could turn out to be really bad. I'll never know if I don't make the leap. Alright, I'm going for it and if it doesn't work out I'll know that I at least tried." This little fish inspires me and helps me see that sometimes you just have to take a chance even though you don't know how it's all going to turn out in the end. We just have to smile and say, "Alright, I'm going for it!" 

So, what choices are you debating between? Are you going to take the risk and grow, or are you content to take the easy way out?