Risking Greatness

I find it hard to believe that it has now been almost 15 years since I was regularly speaking about spiritual intention, a topic for which I still hold passion.  I revealed seven steps to living with intention in my speeches.  One of them was to "risk greatness."  This step described how when we are listening to our inner spiritual guidance system, we will often be guided to do things that don't make sense and which the world around us may judge to be nonsense or crazy.  Yet, when we are guided, we must have the courage to follow through.

Those who have been great in whatever their field happens to be have broken through barriers that others in their professions or their contemporary worlds have judged as crazy. As Monet was giving birth to Impressionist art, he was belittled and taunted as someone who could not paint. Mozart was accused of being mad.

Even famous athletes, who have broken ground in style and performance, have been the object of comedic jabbing.  Dick Fosbury, the 1960s American Olympic high jumper had a unique style of flopping himself over the bar. He broke ground on what is now common in the sport. People of his era thought that Roger Bannister who disintegrate if he broke the four-minute mile, but then within days a number of others passed that daunting milestone.

If we practice whatever is to be our greatness in our own unique way, we risk having people point at us. But, the real risk is to hold back on being as great as the Universe would have us be.  Such risks show up everywhere in our lives, and maybe as often as not, we may be the only ones to know.  Do we hold back on asking a question that may lead to a breakthrough question because it seems like a "stupid question?" Do we stay chained to a job that is limiting our growth just because it is secure? On a splendid spring day, like several we've had recently, do with bridle the urge to jump up and click our heels with the joy of the season? What countless ways do we hold ourselves back?

When we are truly aligned and willing to bring our full courage to bear on whatever is in front of us, we unleash the forces of the Universe in support of us.  I recall when I was writing The Game Called Life. The economy was shaky, and several people had cancelled long scheduled work.  I should have been out drumming up speaking engagements and consulting gigs, but I didn't.  What I knew in my heart was that I had another book to write.  Almost as quickly as I said I was going to do it, the words began to move through me like a wild winter storm across the plains. My hands moved across the keyboard so long and so fast that my wrists ached. The book was finished in five days and, unlike my earlier books, it required little rewrite and editing.

The day after I finished the book, I went to the mailbox, and a check from former coaching clients awaited me. It was around Thanksgiving, and they had been thankful for the work we had done that year.  They sent a thank-you check.  To this day, I recall feeling like the Universe was thanking me for taking time to do what I was called to do rather than what I "should" be doing.

I've been getting clarity about the direction in which I need to be taking my life.  I am about to make a major leap, but it feels to me like the real risk isn't going in the new direction but instead the risk is in not doing it. Over the last few days as I became clearer, people have been coming out of the woodwork to help.  One person, who would have no idea what I was up to, texted me a couple days ago and wanted to have coffee.  When we met, he pointed me to a potential door.

I was channel surfing late at night recently and caught the end of the 1993 film "Grumpy Old Men," a Jack Lemmon-Walter Matthau comedy in which two octogenarians compete for the affections of a slightly younger widow, played by Ann Margaret.  I have seen the movie many times and always love it.  It just so happened this time that as I paused my channel surfing, I caught Jack Lemmon's character say, "The only things in life you regret are the risks you didn't take."

I will have no regrets for not taking risk. Instead, I will risk greatness in whatever small or great way lies on my path.