Crisis. Per our generation’s go-to resource for all information, Wikipedia, crisis is ‘any event that is, or is expected to lead to, an unstable and dangerous situation…deemed to be negative changes…especially when they occur abruptly…’
Having a crisis, being in crisis, or seeing others in crisis is something we fear like it is the worst thing that could ever happen…and it is…
…kind of.
I’m not saying, “Woo hoo! Awesome! My teenage daughter is on drugs and got pregnant,” or “Yeeesss!!! I have cancer! Sweet, I always wanted to be in that club!”
And I’m not insinuating that losing your job, or marriage, or any other very real crisis is necessarily a good thing.
What I am saying is that this moment, this very breath that you are taking in right this second, is the absolute only one you are guaranteed.
Let me say that again. This moment is your life. Take one long, deep inhale and feel it through your nose and into your chest as it expands your lungs wide. Now truly grasp the reality that there is absolutely no guarantee that you will ever have that opportunity again.
Is it really worth spending, potentially your very last breath, being afraid? Is it worth being embarrassed or ashamed or compliant? Is it worth making the excuses that you make to yourself to rationalize or marginalize you life and your potential?
Are you absolutely, whole-heartedly, without a single doubt, living the life you were meant to?
That is what crisis does for you. Crisis, whether real or imagined, clears your head, erases the rules of propriety and expectation, and brings a very primal honesty to light. Crisis doesn’t care that you don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings, or that your mother would never approve, or that you look fat in those jeans. Crisis doesn’t give a flying f*&% about the lies you tell yourself, or what the voices in your head say. It simply is the very real reminder that,
“If you risk nothing, you risk everything.”
The only question now is…are you going to wait for a crisis to remind you to live your life on your terms? To actually find out who you are and honor what you want? Or maybe…just maybe…today you will stop making the excuses that you make every single day about how you can’t, and why you won’t…..and you just will.
Live the life you imagine.