RISK
Hanging on with…..?
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Risk
“A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are for.” ― William G.T. Shedd
Many years ago, I owned a farm in Southern Queensland, Australia and ran an earth moving business from it. One of my team was Tracey, a great guy who rode a Triumph motorcycle, had long hair down to the middle of his back, and absolutely adored his wife Rhonda and their two little girls. He was a real wag and I loved working with him. And he could drive bulldozers! Very important in our game.
The first Tuesday in November in Australia we are plagued with the Melbourne Cup, a horse race run in Melbourne where the prize money for the winners is obscene but it’s still just a horse race. The whole country virtually stops for the day, to let the horses race – it’s an institution!
Tracey said to me: “Having a bet today?”
I replied “No, not today.”
He asked: “Don’t you have a bet sometimes?”
I answered him, “I just bet $50,000 on buying us a new bulldozer; does that count?”
“Never thought of it that way” he said and we went back to work.
My new Earth Mover!
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“A bend in the road is not the end of the road…Unless you fail to make the turn.” ― Helen Keller
What is risk?
Risk is when you stick your neck (or wallet) out for something you think you can win, but it is not guaranteed. Like my bulldozer bet. My business needed a new, more powerful and versatile machine so I chose what I thought would handle the work I had coming in, and the risks I took were that it was the right machine for the work, and that there was enough work to make the investment worthwhile.
Recently I was sent an email with the dubious title “Just wondering…are you a risk taker?”
The email went on to dare me to invest $25 (not much, really) to get an unspecified gift worth $1,000 plus a supposed money-making blogging platform. After all, it’s only $25. How could I go wrong?
When I invested/took a risk of $50,000 on my bulldozer, it was the equivalent value of five new family cars at the time. That was a risk, but not a gamble. I’d calculated the odds, weighed up the work I had and the amount of enquiry I was getting and took that risk. The risk was worthwhile.
If I invest any money at all on what someone else has calculated to have a value, it was THEIR value they used to invite me to take MY risk, then I risk wasting 100% of my money. The possibility is that their $1000 value is not worth a cracker to me, if I don’t need or want the unspecified item they are ‘giving’ away. The blogging platform may be a scam or just plain worthless. Since then, I have been bombarded with more and more emails, up to 3 times daily, trying all sorts of ways to entice me to part with that $25. If that is what the blogging platform requires, then it’s a safe bet I’d waste my money. That is called discernment – or assessing the risk/reward potential. This $25 ‘risk’ I had been dared to was nothing more than a bet, a gamble I was almost sure to lose on!
Risk Vs Reward – Calculate the risk and prepare for it!
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To live is to risk!
People and in fact all living creatures have an inbuilt survival instinct – in other words, they fear for their lives and have this survival program running to protect it. We jump out of the way of moving cars, avoid heights, wild animals, spiders and snakes and so on, because of this anti risk program we have running. Rather than risk death, we aim to stay alive.
“The only safe thing is to take a chance.” ― Elaine May
To love is to risk!
Is this the right person for me? Am I worthy of this person? Can I handle a relationship? Will I be hurt? Will it last? These are all the questions our risk monitors race through our minds when we fall in love, or there is even the chance of it. Is this worth the risk?
“There is no intensity of love or feeling that does not involve the risk of crippling hurt. It is a duty to take this risk, to love and feel without defense or reserve.” ― William S. Burroughs
Is it worth it? Absolutely!
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Being yourself is a risk!
Will I be liked? Will I be accepted? Will I ‘fit in’ with the group? Perhaps this is the risk that people are most frightened of, and why fashion and fads are so powerful in societies. We are conditioned to believe that we are not quite right – perhaps the “Original Sin” conditioning, and that we need to be something else in order to be accepted by everyone else. People are so anxious to ‘conform’ to someone else’s idea of what is ‘right’ or ‘in’, that they are frightened of just being themselves, yet it is what and who we are most qualified to be. No other person on the planet can be YOU as perfectly as you can be! Being outstanding is the key to success, yet it is what terrifies most people the most!
Being yourself is different enough!
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“So we shall let the reader answer this question for himself: who is the happier man, he who has braved the storm of life and lived or he who has stayed securely on shore and merely existed?” ― Hunter S. Thompson
Why do we fear these risks?
Low self-confidence – the fear that we will not perform to the desired standard, and low self esteem – the fear that others will not like or value us, are the two beliefs that anchor us in fear of being ourselves. We fear taking the #risk because we feel we may not perform or may not be liked for trying to perform. Our need to be accepted and liked overrides our desire to succeed, or even try to succeed.
The antidote to this fear of taking a risk is a #personal empowerment program that delivers #self-confidence and #self esteem to you, in small doses, daily, continually, building your confidence and self esteem to the levels where you can walk confidently out into the world, just being you. And proud of it! Knowing that whatever risks you choose to take on you will succeed at. And feel great about!
“Happiness is a risk. If you’re not a little scared, then you’re not doing it right.” ― Sarah Addison Allen, The Peach Keeper
Does such a self confidence and self esteem program exist?
Yes, absolutely, and it delivers much more than self-confidence and self esteem. Confidence is built on repeated experiences of success. The Life Change 90 program teaches goal setting and how to set small goals each day, as part of a larger goal getting program. Each little goal you achieve is a confidence boost. More than that, you learn to harvest the lessons from the day, find where your shortfalls are and work on improving any that matter to your success. Communication skills, financial management skills, unlearning bad habits and installing new habits, all ticked off at the end of the day, to give you that feeling of “I DID IT!!!” Daily tutorials hone in on specific areas and build from month to month to enhance your education in life skills, stress management, health, and personal empowerment generally in all areas of your life!
What she said!
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How do I receive this new personal empowerment?
Small, daily inputs, a few minutes each morning and evening. Reading the tutorial each morning will take a couple of minutes, reviewing your goals and To-Do list, checking off your gratitude list and setting your affirmation a few minutes more, and you are ready for the day!
In the evening, check off your goal achievements, lesson for the day, expenses and income and a few minutes on your journal, and your program is complete! This is your personal empowerment program in full. For investing these few minutes a day, you receive a very healthy boost of self-confidence and self esteem, wisdom and experiences consolidated by your reviews, elimination of bad habits and installation of new desirable habits, and your goals and dreams are delivered to you, a step at a time, day after day!
“Risk anything! Care no more for the opinion of others … Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth.” ― Katherine Mansfield, Journal of Katherine Mansfield
What is the risk?
The risk is that you will get the program and do nothing with it. That’s why you will receive these blogs, week after week after week, a little pep talk, some further education in specific areas and a reminder of how powerful you could be, by living this program as though it was your life. The truth is, it can change your life and in the next 90 days, your life could be incredibly enhanced by it!
If you feel this article has boosted your belief that you can become all you were meant to be, all you ever dreamed of being, and feel good about being YOU, then there are others who need to know this feeling too! Please share it, email the link or reblog it to your friends and anyone else who you think may benefit from reading it. They will thank you too!
Til next time, fair winds and full sails!
Ray Jamieson
“Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.” ― Theodore Roosevelt, Strenuous Life
Please also refer to my other posts on #Empowerment, to assist you with your specific challenge.
Integrity, Spirituality and Empowerment
Being yourself
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