This weekend I finished reading the fantasy novel A Wizard of Earthsea. While reading this book I started to bridge the story line to my personal quest of achieving my goals.
Basically, the book is about a mage named Ged who is on a quest to correct his mistakes in life. Along the way he faces many obstacles that try to stop him in addition to battling his own mind. I won’t go into any greater detail as many of you could probably care less about a fantasy book, but I am going to explain how this book caused me to reflect on my personal journey.
In the book Ged must learn early on to accept and come to terms with the power that he possesses. How many times in our own lives do we not give ourselves enough credit with what we are able to accomplish? I think about my journey of training for the marathon. I had so many times where I was in self doubt about what I was capable of achieving. I was able to overcome that negative talk and prove to myself that I was capable. I am currently going through the same process again as I muster up the courage to really commit to my next goal. This is a tough one. Sometimes I think ignorance is bliss where it would be great to just go after something without any thought to prior experiences that I think hinder our thought processes.
Later in the book Ged realizes that he must confront his past mistake and instead of running away for the rest of his life he has to turn around and tackle the challenge set in front of him. Once again, how many times do we run away from a goal or challenge because we fear the unknown? We make excuses, we run out of time, we quickly find something less challenging to fill the void. People never really understand what they are truly capable of because they fear the risk of making a mistake, falling down, being wrong, _____(you fill in the space). We become so entrenched in a daily routine that we cannot leave our space. That is sad because all of us are capable of so many great things. I think to teaching and how many times we teach students to try something new, push themselves to new limits, don’t be scared, etc., yet we don’t heed our own advice. I am to the point that I need to turn myself around and begin to face my fears of swimming, biking, and training for a long endurance event.
Lastly, I will make one more point connecting goals and the book. Ged fails time and time again to conquer his mission. The quote about how close people are to achieving their goals right when they quit is so true. Failure is part of the process. Being wrong, making a mistake is where most of us learn best. While out riding my bike this weekend, I literally had zero idea about how to shift gears. However, when I shifted the wrong way going downhill and my legs flew off the pedals I learned right then and there how to shift the right way. Failure and making mistakes is what most of us fear the most. However, you have to endure these moments to understand the greatness within us all.
I could make a few more connections, but I think I have made my major points. I hope you gained something from this as I have from reading this novel. Never stop striving to GETTING IT DONE!
Leave a Reply