"Success is going from failure to failure without a loss of enthusiasm".
I read this quote the other day and immediately thought it was hilarious. Then I thought about it again and pondered if it was empowering and showed a tenacity of spirit, and finally I said it out loud and I realized I sounded deluded and ridiculous. When is the right time to give up on our dreams, ambitions and goals? Does there ever come a point when it's time to give up and let your get up and go just get up and get gone?
It's hard to always keep your mind focused and your eye on the prize. We live in a world and society full of distractions, and it's easy to procrastinate, to put off and just put our feet up when we feel like it.
Sometimes our plans and childhood wishes are realized and other times we have to come to the realization that they are never going to happen, it's how emotionally strong and practical we are that denotes how we cope with this. I think I may have wanted to be in a boyband as a child but I'd realized by the time I was 18 that wasn't ever going to happen, for one thing, I wasn't even a boy anymore and secondly, I didn't even want to sing. Now, there are talent shows for the talentless and recording contracts for the witless. Boybands & girlbands, boy wonders and girl teen sensations are routinely signed up, chewed up and spat out. You can make your dream come true on a TV talent show and then cry your tears and spill your guts a few years later on a nightmare of a reality show. There was a time when we all wanted the famous to do was drink champagne and eat cake, now we watch them make their money by joining the D list in the jungle, drinking snake sap and being scared witless. "I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here?" I think it's more akin to "I'm afraid you were almost a celebrity and now a tax bill has put you in there".
It must be hard for anyone in the public eye who sees their career falter. We all struggle at certain times to get by. Isn't it such a shame that a recession has to come at a time when so many people are losing their jobs and homes? Who knew these things came in threes? The reality for most of these "stars" that sign up for a reality show is that they've finally come to the realization that reality bites, it sucks and then it revives their career. It's like the last breath of life into a pair of dying lungs, the flickering flame on a dampened fire and the final countdown on a life of fading obscurity. What do the D list do when the going gets tough? They go into the jungle / Big Brother / I'm a celebrity vet / trapeze artist / embalmer / pig farmer" realm of doing anything for cash, as long as it's on TV. Unfortunately for us, we don't have the luxury of taking the transferable skills we may have learned in the workplace and having a show built around our new vocation in life.
As we grow older our own vision of reality or "our own version of events" change. We all have to make choices and deal with them. Do we stay doing a job we hate or with a partner we can only tolerate? Is the best life a quiet life or do we take a chance and try to change things? It's probably not advisable without the safety net of a reality show or a fame hungry mindset to walk out of a job and change your career, but it's your own reality. Sometimes we just need to "man up" and get on with it. I've taken a chance and left an industry where I was overpaid, over sexed and over emotional (no, I wasn't a hooker) and changed direction so that I can do something I love, something that's creative and something that makes me happy (no, I'm not a hooker). Financially it's meant that I've struggled but I haven't sold out and I haven't yet given up. Sometimes I think I should just go back to what pays the bills and what kept expensive clothes on my back but I have to keep telling myself that this is my reality, this is my choice and this is the only thing I can do.
"Success is going from failure to failure without a loss of enthusiasm".
Deluded & ridiculous? Maybe, but for now it works for me.