"You have to trust in something -- your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever -- because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well-worn path, and that will make all the difference."
- Steve Jobs, who revolutionized the world with his brilliance
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I hate it when you really want to perform an action, but you hold yourself back. It can be the simplest action, like, "Should I say hi?" But you don't.
It's not because you can't do it. It doesn't matter how small the gesture is, but you're afraid of what would happen if you act. Your restraint is based on inscrutable implications, because of unfamiliar social cues. Nothing is really stopping you. Nothing is actually in your way. Instead, you're stuck in this weird tango with yourself, where you're dancing with your own overthinking, your bias, your fallacies, your perceptions. Like always, it is a fear of the unknown. It is a fear of consequence. The consequence could be so small, so negligible, but you're so shaken by the unknown that you cannot move a muscle.
And before you know it, you've lost an opportunity. You've lost a moment in time that you can never get back. And you realize -- that was a moment where your life just branched off in two directions, and you grieve, wondering what would've happened if you only decided to say, "Hi." You're left wondering about what path that could've taken you. But you'll never know now.
After being caught in my pride and my fear, I lost a moment that I can never get back. And now, I wonder.
I'm very tired of living a life like that. I'm very tired of wondering about missed opportunities, about missed chances to change my life. I've learned first-hand about the impact of tiny moments. What if I never missed the bus that day? None of this would have ever happened, the past two months would have never happened, if I didn't miss the bus that day. I would've just sat on that bus to go home, completely unaware that I missed this entire journey. I never would have known this enormous path that my life has branched off to. It's made me change the way I think about everything, about every tiny decision and every tiny gesture. Every decision, no matter how small it may seem at the time, has the potential to change your life.
And yesterday, a collection of tiny moments led to an opportunity. It may have merely been a number of small coincidences, but my relationship with life yelled at me, "You know better. You know better than to brush this off. This is a sign. This is a moment in time where your life is about to go down two paths, and this is a sign. Do not squander it. Do not ignore it." So I decided that I'm going to chase this. I am going to drop everything else, and I am going to spend the next few months, the next few years chasing this opportunity. And hopefully, the rest of my lifetime. And I will never regret it.
"It's about time, Christa!"
Damn right, it's about time.
Stay hungry, stay foolish.