Sandor Benko | Integrating Leadership & Online Marketing

I mentioned on the Daily Feed ~ 2011 June 1st edition that I was joining #Trust30, cool writing project recommended by Ashley Ambirge.

Here’s today’s challenge:

It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude. – Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance

The world is powered by passionate people, powerful ideas, and fearless action. What’s one strong belief you possess that isn’t shared by your closest friends or family? What inspires this belief, and what have you done to actively live it?

(Author: Buster Benson)

Oh don’t get me started.

I get enthusiastic when I think about this. And pissed off too, when I see what people around me are doing.

In my mind, the worst thing that can happen to anyone, is to live an average, mediocre, ordinary life.

A life dominated by “can’t”, “impossible”, and other disgusting, disempowering (disemboweling?) words.

Giving up the childhood dreams while most likely building someone else’s on the day job, and retiring to poverty when the prescribed 40 years of misery are done.

Having an average job.

Waking up to indigestion every Monday morning. Wanting to have a heart attack rather than going to “the job”.

Taking average holidays, (on the days prescribed by your boss).

Driving an average car.

Sending kids to an average school.

Telling them it’s how things are supposed to be (and not being able to look in the mirror afterwards).

All of this adds up to NOT becoming the person you were meant to be. NOT fulfilling the mission you were placed on this Earth for. NOT doing something that’s meaningful to you in most of your waking hours. NOT sharing your unique gifts with those around you. NOT leaving “a ding in the Universe”, as Steve Jobs has put it.

Let’s face it, once you’re in the grinder it’s mighty difficult to get out. The job takes control of your time and money, and you’re a little more than a slave at the end of the day. Do you think that’s a bit harsh? Good. That’s the reality of it tho.

And it all drives me nuts.

But that’s the way it is.

Society was designed for people to survive. It wasn’t designed for people to thrive. If you want to, you have to carve your own way. The schools won’t teach you that. Matter of fact a surgeon friend of mine said that “I have 1000 years of education and that can be detrimental; you learn a lot of what’s not possible.” Food for thought, eh?
In any case, not being taught the ropes at school has never stopped anyone who had a dream and a burning desire to see it through. Herny Ford, Walt Disney, Edison are all dreamers of this kind. Speaking of Ford, he was quoted saying “I’m looking for people with the inability to know what’s impossible.”

What’s my way out then? I’ve become an entrepreneur. I’m busy learning, growing, producing, taking risks, making decisions, networking, and generally doing a lot of previously “uncomfortable” things. I’m working my way out of the system, and matter of fact I’m there for the most part, it’s just my goals that keep getting bigger and bigger.
It was much to my family’s disdain, at first. Giving up safety, taking risks, and basically just taking independent, massive action are not things for the faint-hearted. They’re starting to get the idea now.
My dream is the most important thing to me and I’m willing to die for it. Better dead than mediocre.
Again, my family would disagree, and that’s fine. They’re just thinking about my best interest in their own way, which is all nice. Just remember, if you listen to them, you’ll get the same results they have.