HEALTHY LIFESTYLE · OCTOBER 2018
DARING TO TAKE RISKS
T
he first time anything new and creative is
proposed, it gets labeled. And the label put
on these novelties is likely to be “risky.” Can’t
you just hear it?
“Let me get this straight, Orville. You and Wilbur are
building a machine that will do what? Heavier–than–air
flying machines are the riskiest hoax anybody ever
palmed off on two gullible boys like you Wrights. Get a
real job!”
Or maybe it was somebody’s harebrained idea of
talking pictures, black and white children attending the
same school, or people walking on the moon. More
than one person was berated simply for giving voice to
such “silly” ideas.
It turns out that some of the people who dared to
propose such outlandish possibilities are now regarded
as geniuses, revolutionaries, heroes. And it was only
because they dared to question others and to question
themselves. They challenged the limitations others
were willing to accept without dispute.
Certainly, there is something in your profession
or business, family, or church that could be done
better—a situation could be more productive; a
relationship could be healthier; an objective could be
clarified; some lofty ideal to which all in the group give
lip service could actually be implemented. But I warn
you up front, like restoring a car or house, it will take
twice as long as you think, cost far more than you
anticipate, and strain every important relationship in
your life!
Only you can decide if it will be worth it to undertake
something so ambitious and costly. There will be false
starts. There will be embarrassing mistakes along the
way. But the potential outcome could be as important
to your personal situation as the achievements of the
Wright brothers, Rosa Parks, and Neil Armstrong were
to their time and place.
The problem with our world
is not that there are no more
frontiers to challenge and
conquer. It’s that there are too
few explorers. There are too
few people willing to ask the
obvious questions and challenge
the traditional wisdom. In a
word, too few of us want to
take the risks that could make
us look stupid.
If you are fortunate enough
to have a dream in your heart,
be willing to make mistakes in
pursuit of it. Be a risk–taker. You
just may change the world.
With no irreverence intended, I’m certain people
used that term with Jesus. They called him
demon–possessed and crazy, a blasphemer, and an
insurrectionist, all because he dared to question
conventional wisdom and practices.uestion
conventional wisdom and practices.
10 HEALTHY MAGAZINE
By Rubel Shelly