Doing the impossible

I played half a round of gold the other day with a friend at the nearest golf course (which is pretty much up the road from my house). It was the first time I played in over 8 years so it was going to be rather interesting but nonetheless very exciting.

On the 6th hole I played what I would like to think was a beautiful stroke with my 9 iron. It was the perfect velocity and flight to land perfectly on the green close the hole, but my accuracy was unfortunately just wide and it landed in the bunker.

After my shot we walked to the bunker and my friend looked at me and said:”Just take it out, that shot is impossible.” Now we aren’t professionals and moving the ball wouldn’t change much because we were just having a good time; but the word impossible made me eager to show him that the shot in fact was possible.

It felt like one of those epic moments where all the odds were stacked against me. I get my stance, look at the hole and just give a gentle shot towards the hole. Lo and behold I was able to get enough flight and power to give the perfect shot to not only escape the sandpit but get it pretty close to the hole. What a feeling it was to prove him wrong even though it meant absolutely nothing in terms of our game. But it was still epic.

Having something that is your favourite means that you prefer a certain thing out of all the others of its kind. It doesn’t matter how many new flavours of ice-cream is introduced at your favourite restaurant you will still choose that flavour you always love.

Some favourites can be easy to choose from such as colours, animals and even sports. But there are certain things that aren’t so easy to favouritise. If you look at films, I can only think of a handfew of those that I know that have a favourite film, the rest can’t decide between a select few, and I don’t blame them. There are just so many to choose from which makes it difficult to decide.

One of these tough decisions on favourites are words. But I do have a favourite. That word is impossible. An event that is unable to occur. We tend to use it incorrectly for some reason. Exaggerating how difficult something could be. It seems to be in our nature. We are prone to rather accept that we can’t do something instead of attempting to get it right. There are too few of us challenging the limits of what underachievers have set out for us. We simply believe that what they say is true.

There was once a story of a farmer who had a elephant calf. The farmer didn’t have a fence to sorround it so he tied a rope long enough that the calf was able to move freely but strong enough that it couldn’t escape.

Once the calf became the size of a normal elephant the farmer never realised the rope wouldn’t be strong enough anymore to contain the elephant. But the elephant never tried. So for the rest of its life it was tied to a tree even though it was able to escape.

The elephant never believed it could escape from the beginning so it was bound to stay tied up.

Do not fear failure but rather fear not trying – Roy T. Bennett

We need to break the culture of trying not to fail and make a fool of ourselves but to rather try and try till we get it right. There are some pretty ‘average’ people who chose to face their fears and have failed so often but through it all they learned from it and now are victorious.

Thrive on failure because it makes you stronger. Show others how easy it is to do something that is ‘impossible’ because you will inspire others to try and break the cycle.

And above all, make sure you see the faces of those that say you can’t when proving them wrong.