CHAPTER 47
LOOK AROUND, LOOK WITHIN
While driving on the road of life, we often get to a crossroad. This happens to everyone. You are frustrated out of ideas and query the inadequacies of your capabilities. You might have painted the future picture you are driving at and you seem very certain to reach there at your current pace but alas, it just happens that you find yourself lost at the center of nowhere.
If you have felt this way, know you are never alone. Every person had to go through the same trying time as you. If they came through theirs, you can and will.
Imagine a child who has lost his way. He knows where he is heading to but he is unsure which road leads there. Sure, tears may drop from his eyes and he may fret or worry. That’s what happens when we lose sight of where we intend to be. The great news is, you have a picture or a place you are desirous to reach. The bad news is, you are lost.
Here is some help. This is not a manual, but you can pick up the pieces of your lost life and find direction from it.
When you get to that crossroad and you are certainly unsure of the next route, look around.
Why look around? The reason is you are not the only person lost. Many persons have being in your shoe and have left wearing your shoe. You can learn from them. You will be seeing people returning from the same route that you are yearning to drive. Ask them how the journey has being. They probably have being at the same place you want to get to. Their experiences can be very useful in guiding you.
When you do look around, you will see all kind of persons. Some are like you, lost and they do realize they are lost. Some others are lost but they create the impression they are heading somewhere. You will meet a handful though who have a goal and a perfect picture. They have achieved and would be willing to share their experiences. Go for them. There is nothing wrong following their steps. Ask them how they got through their experience and follow their steps.
Your looking around could get you to books, audios and other self-help materials scattered around you. They may be around but if you do not look, you will not see them. You will have to study them and develop useful virtues from them that will be of help to you now and in the future.
You might have gotten enormous help from looking around but the bulk of the duty is in looking inward. You might have gotten enormous knowledge from all those persons out there but the onus still falls on you to develop the strength to take action.
A guide might have directed you through the route you will have to take to reach your desirous endpoint but you have to walk down the path you have been directed. These paths may be challenging but the resolute you will have to face them.
The very fact that people have being where you are heading to means it is possible to get there, but you will often hear words such as “you have to be strong”, “the race is not for the weak”, “put yourself together”, “fight hard”. What these phrases mean is that there is work you have to do with yourself.
The only help you will get from outside is possibly direction and guidance but it will take a strongly cultivated will, a passion to achieve, a determination to excel and a decisive you, all these cultivated from the inside.
There has to be an interaction between what you get around and what is within. Information obtained from others or even books are meant to instigate the drive inside. The man inside should be developed such that when the external aids are not available, he could drive you.
There is no place for those who are lost. You only get a place when you have finally reached the last busstop.
You have no reason of excuse for failing to reach achievers height. All you need is already available and you can have them once you choose to look around and inward