Relationships, Risk, and the Fear of Getting Hurt

Or perhaps we want nothing more than to find the right girl who you can settle down and build a beautiful life with, only to be stopped by so many thoughts. After all, it’s not even an exaggeration to say that most people don’t make it, why should I try my luck at it?

Do you know how many girls fall in a passionate love with a guy they are sure to spend the rest of their life with, only to find themselves dumped a year later? Or maybe a guy marries the perfect girl, finding out not too long after she accepts the ring, that he’s mistaken what he thought to be an angel, for the devil.

And then what follows after is not too pretty. There’s the heartbreak, the divorce, and the children who will never forgive you—forever wondering why you destroyed their perfect family. And though you may try to move on and forget about her, you can’t help but be kept up at night wondering over and over where it went wrong.

Yes, unfortunately these tales are neither a fantasy nor an exaggeration; they are consequences of what happens when we fail to achieve what we set out to do. We all know the stories, the tales of people crushed under the rocks of their dreams. And though we’re not all sure where we’d like to be, one thing is for certain—it’s not over there.

Avoiding Risk by Avoiding Life

With this illuminating thought in mind, there are various approaches people take as a way of accepting the news. Some of them take the safe route, thereby condemning themselves to a life of loneliness and poverty—preferring to know from the start that they’re failures rather than take the risk at success.

Therefore, even if they find a relationship which they strongly desire to build and develop, they will push it away. Acting as if they’re not interested, like the last thing they want to do is be in a friendship or marriage which they so very long for.

They know that by admitting to the desire to connect, they are putting themselves at risk of rejection, and that consequence is filled with too much hurt and shame. It’s not a position they can even imagine being in. So they push away all opportunity for relation.

After all, you can never be rejected—if you never tried in the first place.

Buried Dreams and Quiet Regret

And let’s not forget all those passions that are swallowed up in the dust, never to see the light of day. How many of us have dreams which we hide under our mattresses, taking all that effort which could have been spent on our dreams, and instead use it to cover them.

How many of us want to become a famous speaker, or a painter which the likes of Da Vinci can’t compete with. How many of us want to build great organizations helping millions of people, become a life-saving doctor, or the greatest composer of your day.

There are so many different dreams, held inside by so many different people, caged in by the fear of the rejection we will receive by exposing them to the world. (I would have put professional athlete in the NBA on the list, but we all know that as short Jews we would never stand a chance.)

Childhood Imagination and Growing Up

What’s the general process?

We are young, fresh in this world with big eyes and an even bigger imagination. Our curiosity bursting for this new amazing planet which we will call home for the rest of our lives, confident that whatever it is that we would like to reach is ours for the taking.

We imagine our future day in day out, confident that it is just a matter of time before we accomplish our goals.

I remember how as a kid I planned on building a roller coaster way bigger than Kingda Ka in my very own backyard. I was going to charge a couple of bucks for whoever wanted to ride it, and was fully confident that it wouldn’t be too long before there would be lines around our block.

I didn’t know what building permits were, and neither did I care. There was no need to look into how much this project would cost me, or even to measure whether a huge roller coaster could even fit in my backyard.

I’m going to break the news to you now before you start asking where you can order tickets—we didn’t end up building it. It was for the best, because my family probably would have never had a moment of peace with this huge line of people crowded in our backyard waiting to ride my work of art.

But that didn’t matter to me. None of that mattered to that little eight-year-old with an imagination big enough to build a universe inside of. All that mattered was that I had a dream, and no matter how crazy or unrealistic that dream may be, I was going after it.

Jewopoly and the Death of Passion

Then there was the time not too long after, when I wanted to create a new famous board game that still hasn’t hit the shelves at a store near you. It would be called Jewopoly, which in short was Monopoly with a Jewish twist.

All of the properties would be Jewish sites and shuls, and you would have to pay maaser instead of income tax. Instead of having a thimble or a car as a piece to move around, you would be given tefillin, a tzedakah box, or a challah knife. (Which I realized may be potentially dangerous upon further consideration.)

And though these may have been noble and great dreams, I stopped pursuing them.

The reason I stopped pursuing them is because I grew up.

Growing up—defined as throwing away any passion you hold within upon realizing that this cold world limits you in an endless amount of ways and you will never make it.

Growing up means to stop dreaming, to wake up and live in a harsh reality where you will be laughed at if you ever step out of the box we call normal.

The Formula Every Dream Requires

Certain ingredients make up the DNA of any dream which reaches fulfillment. Certain ideas, leading to actions required to succeed. Know what they are and you can accomplish any goal you set for yourself.

Firstly, we must be conscious that although the mind is a place which holds no limits, this world most definitely does.

Many boundaries will limit our dreams from the first second that we introduce them to reality.

So bring that into your calculations.

Know that you have to be prepared to do two things.

The first is to expect.
The second is to accept.

Expecting Difficulty Without Quitting

What expectance means is realistically measuring what it is that we are up against. Don’t think that it’s going to be a honky-dory ride on a merry-go-round.

There are going to be a lot of twists and turns all along, risking to throw us off at every step of the way.

That’s okay though. You have risen to the challenge. You know the punches will start rolling—and you’re going in the arena anyway.

Because you’ve accepted the circumstances for what they may be, you know the game is full of challenges and difficulties, yet you’ve committed to play no matter what.

Commitment Changes the Question

This commitment should not be taken lightly in any way. You must fully appreciate the value of the statement that you have put forth, the gauntlet which you have thrown down.

For at this point you are no longer asking yourself whether you should be doing this, but rather how you should be doing this.

The difference between those two thoughts lie on completely different spheres.

So long as you are still deciding whether you want to spend the rest of your life with this girl, you will run out the door at the first sign of danger.

Marriage, No Escape Routes, and Real Investment

Shortly after I proposed to my wife, I told her, “I want you to know that no matter what happens, I will always stay together with you.”

She was surprised that I was bringing up such a morbid topic during such a happy period in our lives.

But I explained to her that I wanted to set the bar from the start.

Because otherwise, if you have that little thought in your mind that if she is just crazy enough you will abandon her and start anew, you will never be invested enough to fight through whatever battles may arise.

Shame, Failure, and the Road to Success

If you have a dream which you wish to pursue, you need to be willing to make yourself vulnerable at all sides.

You must accept that you will probably fail at first.

The road to success is paved with broken glass.

Experience is the result of bad judgment.
Good judgment is the result of experience.

If you can’t accept the shame of being a failure, you will never have the pride of being a success.

The Two Beliefs That Paralyze People

There are two types of beliefs that keep a person from chasing his dreams.

The first is believing you are nothing.

The second is believing you are G-d.

Though they seem opposite, they stem from the same issue—a lack of connection.

Why Connection Changes Everything

Connection changes everything.

When someone comes over and gives a warm gesture, he starts to feel accepted.

And the more he is welcomed in, the more his self-esteem is elevated from a nothing to a somebody.

He knows that he is not perfect, and yet somebody still loves him and accepts him for who he is.

Suddenly, he can make himself vulnerable.

The shame becomes survivable.

Why Nothing Is Worth More Than a Smile

It is for this reason that nothing is worth more than a smile.

You may be taking somebody from the outside world and bringing him in.

You are believing in him—and therefore he can believe in himself.

That smile may allow him to take a risk.

And that picture of your smile will help him more than anything else in the world.

Disclaimer

This essay was written by Albert Gindi and is an original work. No advertising, affiliate links, or monetization is associated with this page.