Posted by Byron G. Nelson aka Style on November 12th, 2007
Why Have We Stop Taking Risk?
We all have taken risk in our lives. Some risk we have benefited from while some have had a negative impact on our lives. However, we took these risk to fulfill a passion or desire. If we take a look at our lives now, depending on how old you are, oh yeah, and who you are. We will see our lives heading in the opposite direction. Where we once threw caution to the wind to find some form of happiness, we are now running with the wind to avoid any confusion or obstacles in our life. What happened to that passion and desire? Is it gone have we grown out of it? Why have we stop taking risk?
The reason why, I believe, is fear. Fear although is a natural part of our lives, is now a crutch that is keeping us from stepping out of our little box. When we were younger we feared no less than what we fear now that we are older. However, we now fear different things. In society today fear is promoted all around us and unfortunately society is not promoting the solution to fear. We turn on our TV and we see terrorism, war, hate crimes, bankruptcy, foreclosure, divorce, debt and many more. Our lives are fuel with fear every second of the day. With that fear we search to find our safety net our barricades to keep disaster from striking. Now in ways protecting ourselves from outside elements is an important and good thing. But what happens when our fear is created and promoted from ourselves. From our own mind. We fear failure of love, financial and family to name a few. Also some of us fear death. Fear has the ability to help or hinder us.
How Does Fear Control Us?
With all this fear we begin to remove ourselves from certain situations in an attempt to save ourselves. We walk around watching and analyzing every step we take. We make our decisions base on the “WHAT IF” factor. We are so worried with what happens if this doesn’t work or doesn’t go the right way. We become consumed in the NEGATIVE of the situation it takes away from any reward that the situation may have gained. When we allow our fear to let us only see one side of the equation we reduce the chance for success, thus leaving our lives in the hands of the unknown.
Risk Through Out Life.
The lives we live from birth to death is consumed in risk. As human our risk is how we experience and learn many things.
As an infant from the moment we are born. Everything we do is a risk. Why? Because everything we are doing is for the first time.
As a toddler we start to take even more risk as we try to explore our new found world. We learn to crawl then we learn to walk. From the attempt of baby’s first steps we see the determination. As a baby stands on their weak legs it desperately tries to take a step not knowing the risk in falling, until he/she falls. However, they don’t give up because they fall, they keep trying and trying till they get it right. Even if its not perfect they enjoy that moment as they inside feel an accomplishment. Also as parents we feel the same accomplishment.
As we grow older into our teenage years risk become more complex and consequences become greater. With things such as experimenting with drugs and sex teenagers take risk daily with or without knowing the outcome. We continue to mold our lives through our experiences.
As reach our young adult years a great deal of risk have been taken. Some more than others. But as we reach adulthood we start to plateau realizing some risk have greater consequences than others we begin to pick and choose which ones are more beneficial.
Which leads us to where most of us are today “THE PRESENT”. We no longer take big risk even ones we would have considered a few years back are now too risky. Is this this the wrong mind set? Is this maturity? Are we now become responsible adults by eliminating threat by avoidance? I say in some ways YES and NO. We spent so much of our lives trying to find our place. Most of us set goals and pursued dreams at an early age. For some of us we lived for the day and for the moment ignored the future. Now we are here today looking back and saying WHAT IF.
The Breakdown.
The breakdown is when we take risk we gain reward. Although all risk doesn’t promote achievements, positive risk does. We are now at places in our lives where we know what we want out of life. We know the general direction where we want our lives to head. What we don’t know always is how to get there. That is where risk comes in, its the unknown that makes us hesitant to taking a chance. If only we were confident in ourself, to know that whatever comes our way we have the resources and knowledge to overcome. But until we obtain the self awareness our lives will be controlled by fear and fear will limit our risk which in turn will limit our success. If we risk nothing we gain nothing….
