Where do we lose the battle? - Disillusionment

Heroism inspires people. When we listen to the incredible story of Benaiah, who chased a lion on a snowy day into a pit and killed the lion, we are inspired. Or when we hear the three stories from the life of Steve Jobs, our hearts are moved and minds stirred. We will be challenged to fight our own battle with fierce courage and achieve what Benaiah or Steve did. These stories challenge us to become champions by staying hungry and foolish. Deep inside we want to be like them and do something monumental with our own lives. Therefore immediately, we make resolutions to imitate our heroes and follow the path they have taken and become victorious in our battles.

While some of us do taste success, many of us face bitter experience of failure. There might be thousand reasons for our failures. It could be lack of preparation; it might be wrong timing, or it could be incorrect method of execution and the list can go on. Many are disappointed or disheartened and they give up too soon. Some will try to follow through, but if they hit the wall more than once, they too conclude they are not hero material and that they are not made for this.

I suspect our resolutions weaken mainly for two reasons. In our pursual to achieve something great, we expect and wait for that one big opportunity that Steve Jobs, or David or Benaiah encountered in their own lives. Trouble is we ignore small opportunities every day. Trust me that big opportunity is never going to come to you, unless you use today’s small opportunity. Secondly, we are unwilling to change our status quo and risk something. Until we risk disrupting our present state and take the first step towards our dream we are not going anywhere.

As we begin to experience failures in our attempts to follow the footsteps of our heroes, the resolutions that are made at the beginning start to wither away. The initial fire, vigour, and passion dry up. We feel disillusioned and defeated. Some of us even feel we are cheated into imitating our heroes. As we cool down, and our fire turns lukewarm, our 'response-ability' gets toned down next time we hear same heroic act. That is, we don’t respond the same way we did at the beginning. Even though a person might be willing to learn from a story, the passion to put it into practice is washed up in failures.

Let me summarize what I have been exploring so far in last four posts. Adventures, heroism, courageous acts of our ancestors impact us to a great extent. They are needed and they need to be heard frequently. Sometimes in repeated hearing the effect gets lost. The effect caused by David’s epic battle with Goliath can be rationalised or played down showing the divine involvement as the source of success; Inspirations emanating from those stories can be ignored through indifference developed by our familiarity with the story; and repeated failures, in our attempts to live upto the challenges thrown at us by those heroic acts, can water down our resolutions and leave us disillusioned.

So what is the solution? How can we overcome these disadvantages and actually do something and inch closer to the elite club of achievers like David, Joseph, Peter or Paul?

Let me propose, what I believe are most effective, steps we need to take or skills we need to develop. They sound familiar but then they are sound.

1.       Unlearn ‘I Know’ attitude

2.       Risk the chance of failure

3.       Live one day at a time.

I'd like to take you through all of three of them in next few posts. Till then don’t let the fire go down.

“Your biggest competitor is your own view of future” – The Visionary’s Handbook