Risks that Matter ~

I asked a client the other day why he wanted to take a sabbatical from his successful career. He said, because he wants to do something that scares the bejeezes out of himself.

I asked another client why more confidence was so important to her. Because she doesn’t want to make her decisions or be motivated anymore from fear, she replied.

Both are risking something to change. One risks his savings, health insurance, security, getting another executive job. The other risks what life will be if she is true to herself. 

Or at least it seems like risk. It feels like risk. But that depends on what you want your life to be.

“Trust means you’re ready to risk what you currently have.” ~ Rumi

My best friend in grade school and I loved the thrill of running off what felt like a small cliff at the beach (who knows how steep it actually was, we were 9) and landing in the deep sand below. I’m not sure if the kids who stood by and watched us thought we were crazy or admired our sense of adventure, but it made us feel amazing.

That is the point of risk. Not simply risk for risk’s sake. It is to risk ourselves, to dare ourselves, into more life.

Risk is a currency of exchange we have with life that allows us to enter a portal of more. More of what? That is up to you. But it will mean emptying yourself of something to experience something greater. 

“Progress always involves risks. You can’t steal second base and keep your foot on first.” ~ Frederick Wilcox

Running off the cliff risked our bodies, our courage, our bold adventure, our imaginations, to roll out of the landing at the bottom or land on our feet and run up the hill to do it again. Children really are our teachers.

What gained in return was more courage, more strength, exhilaration, confidence, and pure play to name a few.

Every breath is our practice with risk. We breathe out emptying ourselves and assume we will have breath waiting for us to breathe back in because this is the way the body works. Well, life does too. 

The kind of risks may change as adults, but not the principal of what they are led by (intuition and imagination) and what risk does for our whole being. We risk ourselves for financial investments, driving across town, for love, and new beginnings. But most of all, we risk ourselves to be ourselves. To empty ourselves time and time again from what is, to experience what can be.

Mediocre doesn’t have one definition. You are defining and redefining it every moment according to what matters to you, according to the kind of risks you take each day, what you no longer settle for, and what you want your life to be now. 

“It’s not because things are difficult that we dare not venture. It’s because we dare not venture that they are difficult.” ~ Seneca

If you’re used to everyday risks, what is something you haven’t risked before? Words of depth left unsaid? Money horded instead of invested in you? A new challenge to your body? A business idea left on the table? Time off? An invention? Desert!

If you live by your comfort zone, what would move your edges out…even a little?

For your life’s sake, take a risk. Take lots of them every day.

Here’s to more of you in the world ❤️

Shelley