God gets you to the plate but once you’re there you’re on your own. -Ted Williams(1918-2002), former member of the Boston Red Sox and last major league player to bat over .400.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep. -Robert Frost (1874-1963), American poet, winner of four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry.
Island Isolation
Two roads diverged in a wood and I – I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference. -Robert Frost (1874-1963), American poet, highly regarded for his realistic depictions of rural life.
Awakened Like A Bear
Have you ever woken up all frustrated and angry that you don’t have what you want? Not enough money, not enough time, not enough life, not enough happiness? Did you yell at everybody around you? Quit your job? Blame the world? Well of course you have. At one point or another we all have felt this way. If you understand what’s happening in that moment it’s actually a great thing if you understand it.
I know it doesn’t feel good and ultimately for most people, once they stop blaming the world, they retreat to the confines of their safe place and collapse. They know deep inside that it’s up to them, that nobody is coming to help….and that’s the spot where the road divides. Two paths. One looks easier, but we are wary. Something doesn’t feel right. It almost looks too easy. The other is clear but rough. It looks like a lot of work. There seems to be a path but there are hurdles and obstacles, but there is an encouraging light shining from somewhere…something we can feel more than we can see.
The Grinders
The sad part is that most jump onto the more trodden path. Only to find out that it’s slippery. What seemed like gold is hardly that, and when we begin we find there are a lot of unhappy people on that path. Many of them are high on something that seems to be repressing who they really are. You can see it in their eyes. they appear okay, but upon a deeper investigation they have an empty look…a “going through the motions” mentality.
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Low self esteem is like driving through life with your hand-break on. -Maxwell Maltz (1899-1975), plastic surgeon, self image expert, and author of The New Psycho-Cybernetics.
According to expert Nathaniel Branden, the definition of self-esteem is the disposition to experience oneself as competent to cope with the basic challenges of life and as worthy of happiness. Yet the part that is most interesting to me is the first component, which is our ability or lack there of, to see ourselves as intelligent enough to survive.
In today’s world we are obsessed with fear and it’s causes…fear of heights, fear of public speaking, fear of creepy crawlers and all things that go bump in the night! However, there it is right in the definition of self esteem itself…the greatest fear of all…perhaps the root of fear itself…it’s our own self concept of whether we are able, or not, to handle the challenges that life offers up!
Think about it…how do you feel when you are faced with a new task, a new way of doing things…do you feel the panic well up inside of you, the frustration that says, ”Why do you have to change now that you have finally become comfortable with the status quo?” Just when you were enjoying your coma, life shows up and throws a monkey wrench in the well-oiled machine!
So that begs the question…why are we so locked in fear? Well perhaps Branden has in fact figured it out…low self-esteem. Maybe now you feel your defense mechanism rising up and you argue that of course you don’t have low self-esteem, look how much you have accomplished. Yet the argument really is founded in how you deal with any and all challenges regardless of your success in some.
