Leave Where You've Been out of Where You're Going

It is an unfortunate thing that we human beings tend to let our past results dictate our future possibilities.

You know, if we did this from birth, we'd never learn to walk, talk or do anything other than cry and sleep.

It's true...think about it. How many times have you wanted to do something and then you thought to yourself, "I'll never be able to do that" or "I already tried that once and it didn't work" or "I wouldn't even know where to begin." Yeah, that's because you're looking at your past as though it defines who you can be today.

Well, that's just silly.

The truth is, every day that you are alive -- every moment in fact -- offers you an opportunity to create who you are being, right here, right now. So who are you being right now? Someone who is bored? Skeptical? Curious? Open-minded? Impatient? Every second of every day offers you the opportunity to be whatever you want.

What an empowering choice!

I am often a skeptic. In fact, when one of my friends called to tell me about an auto-surfing program I told her she must be nuts. "I hear about those things all the time," I told her. "I thought they were just jokes." But when she told me what a good friend of ours is getting paid every week, I nearly fell out of my chair! $2000 a week for doing 5 minutes a day online? That's just insane!

In that moment, I decided to suspend my skepticism--just for a moment--and check it out. And yet, those thoughts kept invading my mind: "How can this possibly work? Who is really making money here? How long will a company like this be in business anyway? Is this even legal? Am I willing to risk money to check it out?"

So I checked it out.

And it's huge. And I did some research online and apparently this is a MASSIVE industry--one that's been around for a few years, and I didn't even know it existed! How about that?

Suddenly, the suspension of my skepticism created a space for me to learn that I really didn't know everything there is to know about making money online. How interesting.

Of course, if I had let my past dictate my future, I would never have put any money into it. I would have thought "Oh, this is just like that envelope-stuffing scheme I tried in high school. These things are all scams." Well, are they ALL scams? Let's take a look at this kind of generalized thinking:

Are all lawyers snakes?
Are all politicians dishonest?
Are all rich people snobs?
Are all fad diets unhealthy?
Are all men pigs?

Hardly. And lemme also say "hell no!" So perhaps we see that this way of thinking doesn't get us too far along if we're trying to invent possibilities for ourselves.

So I threw in a few bucks. We'll see what happens. I'm not spending what's not in my pocket yet, but if it pans out, I could have a new Corvette in about six months. From investing a little capital and 5 mintues a day. And what a story I'd have to tell then, eh?

Now that's a story worth hearing.

And your question for today:
Are YOU telling a story worth hearing? Or is it the same old story everyone (including you) has heard over and over again? What are you willing to suspend from your past (for just a moment) in order to create the possiblity of a new (and brighter) future?