Unexpected events happen to us all.
This is why it is never completely within our power to determine the acceleration and elevation of our lives. We can, however, influence our futures to a meaningful degree through the intensity of our energies and the direction of our activities.
Your energy and your activities, your decisions and their consequences are the gas pedal, the gearbox, the steering wheel and the roulette wheel of your life.
- Energy is the fuel that determines how fast your motor is spinning.
- How much energy are you expending each day?
- Activities determine your acceleration.
- What are you doing each day with your time?
- The amount of time you spend doing a thing – let’s call it “practicing” – determines whether you are in first, second, third, fourth, or fifth gear.
- Decisions spin the roulette wheel of Probability.
- Consequences follow decisions.
- Some of these consequences will be the ones that you were hoping for when you made your decision. Others will not.
Unintended consequences happen to us all.
Serendipity is an unintended consequence that works in your favor. Catastrophe is an unintended consequence that works against you.
Never assume that the roulette wheel of Probability will always land on a winning number. Even when you have a 90 percent probability of winning, one out of every ten spins of the roulette wheel will punish you for no reason.
It isn’t fair.
It isn’t right.
You didn’t plan for this.
You didn’t choose it.
But it happened.
Get over it. Get past it.
Deal with it. Move on.
Do not allow your ears to hear your mouth tell the story of your bad luck. Do not let your eyes read the words of it; for every time you revisit your dark story, you empower that one, bad spin of the roulette wheel to determine the acceleration and elevation of your life.
Quit whining and start winning.
What will you do with your energy and activities, your decisions and their consequences?
Will you choose a journey that is structured and predictable, or will you choose an exciting adventure?
Predictable, structured journeys are often tedious and soul-sucking.
Adventures are exciting because they bubble with trouble and danger. If there lurks no Wicked Witch, no dragon, no lions or tigers or bears, you are not having an adventure.
Paul Tournier wrote a marvelous book called “The Adventure of Living”.
Here are a few bits of its wisdom:
“The excitement of adventure rescues us from the Sea of Introspection that drowns many of those who hesitate.”
“The adventurous life is not one exempt from fear, but on the contrary, one that is lived in full knowledge of fears of all kinds, one in which we go forward in spite of our fears.”
“The law of adventure is that it dies as it achieves its object.”
Dorothy, go, adventure beyond the Wicked Witch, the flying monkeys and the sleep of the poppies, all the way to Oz.
Bilbo, go, adventure beyond William the troll and the spiders of Mirkwood into the lair of the dragon. Ride through the skies on the backs of giant eagles and return home as an altogether different Hobbit.
Frodo, go, adventure to Mordor with elves, dwarves, and men, destroy the ring, save Middle earth, then sail away on the White Ship to the Undying Lands.
Go, reader, find your adventure and feel alive again.
Roy H. Williams
The Wall Street Journal published a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper on September 12, 2001, the day after 9/11. Their offices had been destroyed. The boss could not be reached. The Journal was published, nonetheless.
Listen as deputy rover Maxwell Rotbart interviews roving reporter Dean Rotbart, his father and co-host. They are talking about Dean’s newly expanded September Twelfth: An American Comeback Story. What we can learn from the Journal’s extraordinary response to a crisis that no contingency plan would ever have anticipated?
You are unreachable and your offices have been destroyed. Do your people know what matters? Do they feel empowered to act?
Can you believe that 9/11 happened 25 years ago? You will find it all at MondayMorningRadio.com
NOTE: First published in 2021, September Twelfth received a Gold Medal from the Nonfiction Authors Association.
