"Do It Yourself"

It’s occurred to me that in the recent months, I’ve pushed myself to become as self-sufficient as I could possibly be. Perhaps it was a product of my strong sense of independence, or maybe of my eagerness to prove to myself that I had it all together.

As I slowly tied up the loose ends of 2005, I realized how unbelievably driven I was by the idea of being successful. I finally had a good career that provided me with the sort of stability and resources I wanted for myself and for my future. I strongly felt that I was capable of doing absolutely everything on my own. I was competitive. I was ready to conquer whatever tasks were placed before me, formally and informally.

Quickly I learned that I was limiting my potential by not identifying and embracing those in my environment who had treasure troves of qualities that could help expand my world and vision. I learned that I could not achieve everything I wanted simply by deciding that I could do it all by myself. In a sense, I was allowing myself to be held prisoner by my “do it myself” kind of attitude. I realized that I could achieve more and learn more by reaching out to the caring hands that were willing to guide me onto a steady harbor. I was trying to achieve, alone, that which I could redeem in half the time with help from people around me; and it was during that epiphany where I realized that I could control how big I chose to make my world… simply by the amount of people I allowed into my life ~ I mean, really allowed into my life.