By Jill MacGregor
Life is a personal quest that can set you on the path to slay dragons and monsters, find your holy grail or discover a way to float in the goodness of everything that surrounds you. Many times you find yourself with the same question marks above your heads: what is the next path to take, who should be at your side, will you succeed?
Sometimes, you just stand there, waiting, immobile until all answers come to you. Mistakes are messy, you think. What if you do the wrong thing?
But there really are no mistakes. Everything has led you to this moment. You are the machine that is uniquely designed to accomplish this task—yes, even if you’re not quite sure what *it * will ultimately be.
Maybe you should treat these new things as if you were starting a race. The gun goes off and your primary action is to get out of the gate fast. Let’s face it, you’ve trained for this. You’re in the race for a reason. But no one ever wins the race without taking the first step.
Ask yourself these questions while you’re waiting in the block for the starting gun. And, for fun, jot down the answers.
- What are you compelled to do? Couldn’t stop if you wanted to and it goes beyond mentioning that you have no inclination of ever stopping. One on the reasons: you’re good at it. When you are doing this thing, it feels easy and it all makes sense—because this may be the thing you were made to do.
- What is the thing you love so much you could stop if you had to? You have *this thing* and if someone took it from you, you would hissy and stomp until you got it back—what is that thing you have to do? Try not to figure out how it becomes a career or is monetized—just identify.
- What grabs your attention in a way it doesn’t grab others? We all have those unusual things, our little tweeks— we notice that others don’t seem to, details that stand out differently to you than the rest of the crowd. You have an eye for it. You see the special, even if, when you reflect, it may make you feel like you have a teeny tiny case of OCD. Make a note of it.
- What would you do even if no one paid you for it? You love it so much, you’d do it for free. You’d keep doing it if no one ever saw it, no one ever read it, touched it —or loved it. You love and appreciate it so much, so ridiculously, that it is its own reward.
Take a look at what you wrote down. These are clues, Nancy Drew. Put this somewhere you will see regularly, and watch what starts to come up.
You know, others are cheering for you. You aren’t the only one who wants to see you cross the finish line first. You have a fan club, a quiet group of people who are perched on the edge of their seats just waiting to see your next move.
There are a lot of people who think you’re going to win, you’re going to find it and you’re going to make it yours.
