On Your Own Terms

If an A-List producer wanted to film the story of your life, would it be an Oscar-winning epic or a direct-to-on-demand cure for insomnia? OK, that’s a little harsh, but it does open up an interesting topic of discussion.

How well has your life been going so far? Have you been living your life to the fullest and making good use of your enormous potential? Or, have you been letting other people write your story for you, telling you what you can and cannot do, what your personality is like, and what is good enough for you?

You know, your life could be a glorious thing – the kind of story Hollywood producers would love to film or novelists would love to write about. Because the truth is that living an exciting, challenging, satisfying life is not something that is reserved for people who have a special something in their genetic makeup, who are especially smart or good looking, or who were raised by wealthy parents who gave them every advantage.

Whether or not to live a wonderful life is a choice all of us must make at some point. It is also a commitment to grow into that choice – to make yourself into a star or a hero, no matter where you are starting from, no matter how long it takes, and no matter what you need to learn to do it.

We weren’t born to be bored with life. We were born with the ingredients to cook up an incredible life – we just need to put the recipe together.

By the way, being a star doesn’t necessarily mean being in a big-budget movie, and to be a hero you don’t have to have special powers in order to save the world. But you do need to have the courage and determination to discover your own special talents and gifts, and then persist in making the most of them. You can be a hero, on your own terms, in your own way.