You do not have forever to fulfil your purpose. Start out now!

This is an excerpt from Liberty Dancehouse, a small book on personality and purpose by Kehinde Fawumi. Get a copy here

There was a story told of a young man who drove up a cliff and had an accident. He crashed into a pile of abandoned objects lying on the tip of the cliff. He was however saved by a shrub to which he held firmly while he cried for help. “Is anyone there to help?”. He heard a voice speak back to him: “I will help if you can trust me, release yourself from the shrub. I will catch you before you crash into the abyss”.

Considering the reality that he’s a dead man if he released himself from the shrub, he felt disappointed and shouted: “Is there anyone else there to help?”

How many times have we asked such questions? “Is there an easier way to go?” “Is there anyone else there to help?”

The most painful thing is that we never get an opportunity to live a full life as long as we yield to our fears and consider mediocrity over excellence.

Jack Canfield says: “Don’t worry about failure. Worry about the chances you miss when you don’t even try.”

Anything is possible when we allow ourselves to explore our possibilities. The fear of failure is worse than failure itself. When we fail to confront our fears, we deprive ourselves the chance of ever winning. As long as we choose convenience over conviction, we excuse ourselves from reaching our greatest potentials.

Fortune is evasive and can only be sustained by purpose and courageous actions. Whatsoever you desire of good is yours. Stretch your hand and possess it! Don’t be afraid to walk the broken roads. If you have skills apply it! The world and you will profit from it. You need no permission from anyone to perform. Fortune waits upon every wise step you take with courage. Grasp the positive and be positive.

We all are sometimes faced with unfair and undeserving situations which weigh us down. The worst decision anyone could take is to accept defeat! Any time hurting situations appear in our realities, we must learn to reach deep down our hearts and find courage to keep moving forward. We must seek strength in our weakest times and happiness in the saddest moments.

“The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, but they, while their companions slept, were toiling upward in the night.”  

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The fear of failure is all in our minds. It is our mind that keeps us in bondage and holds us back from striving for what we desire deep within. However, we can learn to change the way we perceive every situation. We have the greatest influence on our own thinking, imaginations and interpretations.

We can’t always control our environment, but we can always control our attitudes. It’s how we react to situations, not the situations themselves that influences our chances for success or failure.

One important thing is to be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are feeling for what at best we should feel, what we are for what we could become.

No matter how broken, inconvenient or rough, walk that road!

This article was first published on LinkedIn. Read it here.