I first met Shantelle at an author fair a few years ago. Her table was near mine, and we had a brief conversation about the local author’s group that I lead. I got her email address so I could invite her to the monthly meetings. She impressed me as an intelligent, beautiful young woman. She also had a unique hairstyle featuring many complicated long braids.
Fast forward
to almost two years later. I am at a networking event, and I see a group of
three women new to the group. I introduce myself to the first two, but when I
introduce myself to the third, she breaks out into a big smile and giggles
loudly.
“Oh, Don!
You know who I am. We’ve met before.”
I study her intently while my brain is spinning for some recollection who she is. I end up just standing there, clueless.
“I’m
Shantelle! she exclaims as the giggling resumes.
Of course, I’m
much embarrassed, believing that my fading memory has failed me once again. I apologize
profusely, glad that she is amused and not offended by my faux pas.
I strike up
a conversation with her and her friends when it suddenly hits me why I failed
to recognize her.
“Wait!
Your hair! Your hair is totally different! That’s why I didn’t recognize you!”
I blurt out, interrupting the discussion.
Now the
giggles are replaced by hearty laughter by all the women.
“Yes, it’s
very different than it was when we first met,” she admits.
We become Facebook
friends soon afterward, which hopefully helps my memory when I see Shantelle
the next time. It was quickly apparent by Shantelle’s posts that her hair is
one of her hobbies. She changes her hairstyle frequently. However, regardless
of the various styles, there is one constant. If every photo, she remains
strikingly beautiful.
I messaged her:
Have you ever thought about doing some modeling?
Her response:
People tell me that all the time, lol, but I’ve never pursued it.
I’ve encouraged
Shantelle to put together a portfolio and submit it to an agency. She has not
done it yet, but I hope she does, because:
YOU NEED TO
PURSUE YOUR DREAMS
You need to
at least try things to see how high you were meant to fly. And you can’t do
that standing on the ground. People don’t try because they are afraid to fail.
But you get more out of life when you fail often and when you fail big.
This sounds counterintuitive.
But you must go for it. No one succeeds on their first attempt. Often the people
who accomplish much are the stubborn ones, or even the stupid ones, who try and
fail, over and over again.
YOU HAVE TO
GO FOR IT – AND KEEP GOING FOR IT
Most people
stop because failure hurts. This life is a long-distance race. All long-distance
runners come to the point in the race where the pain reaches its apex. At that
point, you can easily alleviate the pain by just stopping. Quit the race, stop
the pain. But the winners know they must run through the pain to finish the
race.
So pursuing
these dreams guarantees you will suffer failures. Failures generate pain, which
is burdensome because your own actions created it. But to become a success, you
must fight through the pain. Why is it like this? This is life and how you choose
to live it.
And most of
your dreams, if not all of them, will die at some point. The death being
painful, so painful at times that you feel you cannot go on, but you do.
Because that is how life works. And some people will fulfill their dreams and
go on to do great things. We are better off for those high achievers who wouldn’t
have achieved, unless they tried, and failed at the beginning.
There is a
risk of failure. There is also a risk of not trying. It is called “regret”. And
regrets are lousy because they tend to be persistent and difficult to shake. I
have a list of failures, things I tried, which never worked out. But someday,
when I’m sitting in a nursing home, contemplating my life, I’m not going be
saddened by my failures, and more importantly, I’m not going to be haunted by
my regrets in these areas.
YOU NEED TO PURSUE YOUR DREAMS. YOU NEED TO
TRY
If you are
young, you need to pursue these dreams with passion. If you are older, and winding
down your life, you need to encourage the younger people in your influence to pursue
their dreams.
I hope Shantelle
follows my advice and sends her portfolio to an agency, just to see what
happens. Probably nothing will, but she won’t know until she tries. If she
doesn’t, she is still pursuing dreams in other areas of her life.