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Life’s never a smooth sail. There’re icebergs all over the sea, some big , some small and you have to sail crashing into icebergs to move forward. Many a times an iceberg is too strong to be broken, it is too hard to be moved even by an inch. It will completely shatter your ship, as there’s no way to go. It’ll break it into pieces and drop you in the icy cold water.
For days you will doubt yourself, for days you will feel broken, blank, uncertain and anxious and you will have thoughts of a lost future. You would not have any answer on how to move forward. The pieces and cargo of your broken ship floating around you.
So how will you move forward then ? This is the darkest hour It would require you to come out of your present self and be more and that is where the transformation happens.
Ever heard of James J. Braddock ? He was an American Pro boxer who was in his prime when he lost multiple fights due to a chronic hand injury. During the same time, the great depression hit the country and he as forced to work as a daily wage worker in a dockyard to take care of his wife and children. There were 1000s of jobless men and women who used to gather at the dockyard main gate and wait for their luck to be chosen for the day. If you’re not chosen, you don’t have money for the day. Many a times his children got unwell due to bad weather and lack of food, he and his wife used to sacrifice their food for the children…..and some days he even had to ask for financial assistance till the time came when his wife decided to move the children out of their place. It was a very hard time for Braddock – his darkest hour ! Luckily his manager arranged for couple of pro fights which gladly Braddock won and finally got a shot at the world heavyweight championship against big bad Max Baer. He trained very hard, like never before as it was not just a boxing fight, his family was fighting with him. .When asked what if he loses to Baer, Braddock said “I’m training for a fight. Not a boxing contest or a clownin’ contest or a dance”, whether it goes 1 round or 3 rounds or 10 rounds, it will be a fight and a fight all the way… When you’ve been through what I’ve had to face in the last two years, a Max Baer or a Bengal tiger looks like a house pet. He might come at me with a cannon and a blackjack and he would still be a picnic compared to what I’ve had to face.”…and he won the fight to become the reigning World champion for two years straight.
Very important lesson to learn…..when your ship hit the mighty iceberg you are not prepared, you are also not prepared to fall in the icy cold sea water. But to move forward you have to start to swim(take action), pick the broken remains of the ship (belief), identify your tool box (your abilities, your self-confidence) an start rebuilding the ship i.e. your path this time even stronger and mightier to blow away even the mightiest iceberg. This ship now is the strongest ship in the sea and ready to endure any iceberg in it’s way.
In your darkest hour, when everything’s on the line, when you are financially down and out, no job, no food, no friend or family there to help and people questioning your abilities, you’ll have to pick yourself up even if your entire soul is giving up, take that one step believing you will make it even if there’s no reason, no “rational” reason to do so. Put one foot in front of the other, start to work harder, do the right things – if you are on the farm, get up an hour early, prepare your body, work continuously with just one break for food, have a checklist for the day and tick on it as the day goes by. Do it again and again and again till you get stronger and transformed in the person you always dreamt to be. And once everything is said and done, you will have all the strength and endurance to wrestle even the mightiest storm since now you know you have fought in the darkest hour with all you had even when your soul felt at it’s lowest. Imagine what will happen when you have gathered such an experience of the darkest hour, you are more confident than ever and the storm rises again, YOU WILL KILL IT !!
This is life’s way of helping you achieve your dreams, don’t run away from adversity or don’t kneel in front of it hoping that things will be normal, rather take the first step by doing the right things and greatness will chase you down !!
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