Nothing Can Keep You Down

Many great names and brilliant minds in history have overcome great obstacles to get where they got. Today they are called geniuses, such as Albert Einstein, Picasso, Stephen Hawking, and many others. However, when they first dared to dream big, people considered them “crazy” for their super innovative brilliant ideas. They did not let the labels stop them; instead, they turned them into tools to disable fear and unbelief. They used what was supposed to hinder them and disabled the brakes that stops most people from achieving what is considered craziness, nonsense, and even impossible. Even though they all faced different obstacles in their journey to success, they all have something in common; they achieved greatness.

We need to learn to go around the circumstances that are holding us from success and the progress that we want and use it as fuel to advance towards our objectives. People that experience extreme poverty or have lost everything they consider to be important in life, for instance, may feel like they have hit rock bottom. From the bottom, the only way is up. You can’t dig a bigger hole from the rock bottom and keep going down. There is just one way out, and it is up. Likewise, when you are depressed, you can’t go any further down sometimes, and the only way out is up. The help, the solution to the problem, is up! So, look up! The only direction you can go is up now. If the bottom is where you find yourself now, you know you are just about to go up. However, how long you stay at the bottom is up to you to determine. You must make a choice and stand up.

I’m not saying it’s easy. It is not easy when you feel like there is no way out or when you can’t see a light at the end of the tunnel. It is not easy when you’re hurting so badly that you don’t know where to look for help or when you’re so frustrated that you can’t think rationally. It is not easy when desperation takes you to the edge and it seems like waiting is not an option.

But there is a way out, and if you just look up, you will find it. All power and hope come from above, where someone or something, if you will, has a strong hand ready waiting to pull you up.

What is making your progress or success difficult? What is holding you back? Is it the lack of money to pay for your rent next month? Is it the weight that you put on because your working hours don’t allow you to have time to exercise? Is it the need to learn a new language, because you are in a foreign country and the language barrier is challenging? Is it the fear of failing as a parent? Is it the fear of getting onto that plane and going on that trip that you always dreamed of? Is it the insecurity in doubt in your relationship with your partner? Is it your inability to deal with the traumas of your past? Is it your inability to put on the brakes when you’re coming down from a mania episode and you know you are going to crash down again?

Like anyone else, you may have flaws, but don’t focus on the flaws, focus on the many qualities that you have. Have you thought about what limits your confidence in yourself? Perhaps it is your inability to see yourself as the most beautiful and precious human being ever created. Perhaps it is the anxiety that takes your sleep away and keeps you awake night after night, thinking over and over about so many things that you cannot even pick out a thought to focus on. Is it your anger that you can’t control once you’re pushed to the edge? Is it the fear of an audition for that band because you don’t think you’re good enough? Is it the chronic pain that takes away the joy of doing things as you used to do? Is it the fear of going to that party with your friends because there’s going to be alcohol there and you cannot afford to expose yourself to such temptation? Is it depression that weighs so heavy on you that you don’t even have the strength to get off the bed? What is holding you down today?

If we think a little harder, dig a little deeper, and be honest with ourselves, we will find out that, although it may seem like it is a complex net of things tangled all around us, the truth is that there is one main thing that is the root for all the set back and hold backs. Fear it is! Fear is a seed that has been passed on by many generations before us. It grows deep roots that cannot just hold someone back but also paralyses someone to the point that one may actually believe in a non-existent version of themselves or their reality.

Fear is like a poison. It is a monster that can grow as big or as small as our imagination allows it to grow. It also has only the power that we give to it. Because the moment we decide to look fear in the eye, it will fear us and dissipate in thin air. Shadows seem to be bigger and scarier in the dark, but when the light shines and we look closely, we may realize that there is nothing to be afraid of after all.

Whatever is holding you down or holding you back today is not permanent; just like things that held you back in the past no longer have a grip on you. You have overcome so much throughout your journey. Many times, you were not even aware of the power you had to overcome your setbacks, but now you are about to make a big change. I am excited to tell you that once you know who you are and what you are capable of, your life will not be the same, because the lenses that you will see life through will not be the same either.