Risk - Not Just a Board Game

"To laugh is to risk being a fool. To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.
To reach out to another is to risk involvement.
To express feelings is to risk exposing your true self.
To place your ideas, your dreams, before the crowd is to risk their loss.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying. To hope is to risk despair.
To try is to risk failure.
The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing and is nothing.
They may avoid suffering and sorrow, but they simply cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love or live.
Risks must be taken because, the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
Only a person who risks is free."
- Leo Buscalia

What are you going to risk today?

I often find myself stuck.

In a rut. Non-moving.

Yet infinitely comfortable.

I don't risk anything.

I relax and let life pass all around me and some days this feels excellent.

I am safe. I am okay. I am fine.

Yet some days I silently rage against my own passivity.

My feet are sucked down into the mire of the boxed-in, the boring, the stagnant.

I do the same things, make the same mistakes, watch as the piles grow higher and the overwhelming feeling of failure rears it's nasty head to attack my self-confidence.

I want to be a person who risks.

I want to put myself out there and be vulnerable and not be afraid.

I wish I did not care what other people thought; thought of me and how I look or how I speak or of what I can do. I do care. But I want to risk more and take more chances and finally see some amazing results.

I want to take my little handful or plastic army pieces, scoop them all up and throw them in the direction that looks promising, that looks interesting and a little bit scary. Whether that strategy works for me and I conquer that neighbouring opportunity or not...once I let go, I'll have to have the courage to wait and see.

I want the courage to step out of my boots and out of the quicksand of my life and make changes.

I no longer want to be just fine.

I want to risk.