Life Has no Opt-out Button
How to face your challenges
Whenever we leave our comfort zone and head towards greatness, we have another voice that says:
Why bother? Do I really need to learn this new stuff? It’s uncomfortable, and I don’t quite feel myself.
But try as we might, there is no way around it: one has to play by the rules of society, its expectations, norms, and aspirations.
In a very old story, a warrior wanted to opt out and become an ascetic. His wise friend counseled him that what drives him is cowardice and fear, not transcendence.
At the end of the story, when the warrior has resolved his internal conflicts and achieved grace, he still cannot abnegate his duties to go into the mountains. Instead, he still fights, but now with his full focus, commitment, and determination.
There is no opt-out because we are inevitably drawn into battles and conflicts, even if we wish not to be: our roles are already cast, and people or our conscience will force us to play them.
But we can opt-in. We can say yes. We can feel, accept, and then let go of what we are clinging to and emerge victorious on the other side of fear and uncertainty.
Our biggest fear? Living and feeling the way we dream we could — because we want it so badly and because we have faced setbacks before, we find it almost impossible to open up with the same degree of naivety, but that is where all the rewards are.
