For as long as I can remember, I have been arrested by the fear of failure and rejection. It didn’t matter what the situation happened to be; if it involved taking some sort of chance or I was running the risk of being turned away, my heart ached and my brain buzzed with warning. The thought of coming up short of my intentions was enough to hold me to where I was. And the idea of being rejected, of being told “No,” caused more than a few instances of obsession and panic. These horrid possibilities collected their powers and convinced me over and over again that I was okay where I was and in what I was doing. There was no need to explore or strive for anything new because I had placated myself into accepting the position I already held in life. If I simply sat in contemplated complacency and restricted myself to what I had already achieved and accomplished, there was no possibility of my being embarrassed by failure or rejection. And there I rested, stagnant and unmotivated; taking no chances, experiencing little life. So when a friend handed me Donald Miller’s A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, I found myself inspired and conflicted all at once. His words stirred something inside of me. In this wonderful book, Mr. Miller explores what it means to live a good story while using his own life as an example. Through instances of adventure, risk, and even failed romance, he examines the process in which he decided to begin to live a better, more fulfilling life and in turn, consciously leave behind a better story than the one he had been living up to that point. The feeling I got from simply reading of another’s decision to live life outside of the norm was incredible. When I finished the book (in one sitting because it’s that good) I found myself craving to live that sort of life. I wanted to kayak down some lost river and bike across the country. I wanted to take chances that resulted in me meeting people like Bob Goff and experiencing their inspiring stories. I wanted more from my days. But mostly, I wanted to live a better story than the frightened, risk-free one I had been meandering my way through. And still, despite my fresh outlook and deepened desire to be and do more with my life — I found myself tethered to the same old fears, the same old squeamish hesitations. Whenever I considered stepping out in faith or chance, those old monsters slowly reached out and pulled me back to the safety of my complacency. Whenever I found myself on the verge of putting myself forward through the risk of rejection, I discovered that I was still firmly standing on solid, meaningless ground. I was going nowhere and I was living even less. Something, somewhere, had to give. Determined to break free from the prison my own fears and insecurities had built [...]
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