The glorious past
What if you have done something and you think you can’t surpass it? You replay it all in your head – all that glory, all that attention – and you panic. No, it is not possible for you to do something like that again. And then you wonder what possessed you at that time, what power, what connection to the divine. And why you have lost it. You are at a loss. What do you do? When you – and maybe others (especially others) – have such a high expectation of you.
There are many – the one hit wonders, those who have written one great book (and, failing to write, rode on the success of that one book), those who have invented something and are lost in obscurity, the has-beens, the actors and actresses who were at their prime and then no longer, the singers who could only croak now that age has overtaken them.
What do you do?
You show up. Accept it, accept the gift for what it was, coming at the most opportune time for you. Accept that maybe it has gone, that maybe it has stayed, and do whatever it is you do. Without expectations, without longing, without comparison for the you that was.
Because it was a different time. Maybe inspiration struck at that exact time and the universe aligned.
Maybe it will again – for you, or maybe it won’t. It does not matter.
Michael Jordan took up golf.
Julie Andrews accepted she could no longer sing as Maria sang.
Coelho wrote other books.
Some of their attempts to recapture their old glory took off, others did not. But at the end of it all, that is really what one can do – to show up and dare and try.
Again and again and again.
And not be cowed by their own greatness.
Or reduced to a mass of nerves by the memory of what they have done.
In the end – to move forward – those are the only choices one is allowed to make.
Article by Issa. Art by Danvic.
Copyright 2009-2012.
Website: www.YouWantToBeRich.com
Email: issa@youwanttoberich.com