How high can you reach? What is your limit? Everybody has one. That “thing” we wish we could do but because we can’t do as well as others. We end up focusing on our limits and we sabotage ourselves into believing we can’t rise that high, we can’t do it at all, or in our most desperate times, that we can’t do anything, our justification to not try. Why do we do this? It may come from using others’ achievements as a comparison.
Although we firmly believe you are the one who matters most in your life, it is inevitable that we will compare ourselves to others. There can be good in that. There is nothing wrong in wanting to be like someone else but there is danger in wanting to do like someone else. You can want to be like Marie Curie, but unless you are well versed in radiology you cannot duplicate her contributions. Yet you can duplicate her tenacity to continue searching for solutions, contributing fully of your talents and reaching for your own stars.
Blogger and ROAMcare community member Dayle Rogers recently wrote in one of her posts, “We are often our worst critics when it comes to pushing forward and taking risks in life. … [W]e allow others to impose limits that lead to discouragement and despair, the death of dreams, and the feeling of being trapped. … [W]e need to choose what we can control–our attitudes–and let go of what we can’t change. Free ourselves up to dream and try.” (1) She presents as an example of one choosing to control what we can control, Carson Pickett, born without a left hand and forearm, a former starter for the Florida State University women’s soccer team who is competing now as a member of the North Carolina Courage franchise of the National Women’s Soccer League. It was noted that Ms. Pickett had often shared her father’s advice to her to, “Never let anyone turn your sky into a ceiling.”
We are good at building ceilings. Glass ceiling , pink ceilings, bamboo, ceilings, canvas ceilings, celluloid ceilings – all terms coined to describe barriers to advancement of certain ethic or creative types. The descriptors for the people who have taken control and reached the skies beyond the ceilings are not so prominent.
How high can you reach? You can reach as high as you want – certainly at least beyond the ceiling! The first step in breaking through to those new heights is to believe that you can. The second step is to believe yourself when you say that you can. And the third step is to believe in yourself and hen do what you know you can. You might never be another Marie Curie or Caron Pickett. That’s fine. We already have one of each. You just need to be the best you there is, no matter who you are.
There is a sky full of stars beyond the ceiling. One of them is you.
(1) Rogers, Dayle, “Don’t lose sight of the sky,” Tip of my Iceberg, daylerogers.com, https://daylerogers.com, 18 July 2022.
