Saturday, September 29, 2018

Second Chances


Second Chances
                                                                Tim Connor

Do we all need a second chance from time to time?  How about a third one?  Or more?  Ever had a second chance and ignored it?  Ever had a second chance and in hindsight realized that it positively changed the trajectory of your life in some way? These questions are not redundant.  We all get second chances, even more, that we ignore, don’t realize or even spurn for any number of reasons.

How about a second – health chance?  How about a second – career chance? I know you are getting bored by my questions – see what I mean?  I’m just trying to set up the foundation for this article and you have lost your patience for giving me a second chance or I have touched a sore spot in your life and you wonder where I’m heading.

Either way, the entire question of second or third, fourth or 100th chances is moot if we don’t see the need to evaluate them, consider them or take advantage of them.

If I had to bet – there is some area of your life right now where you wish you could have a second chance?  Am I right?

What exactly is a second (or another) chance?

It can be a new beginning, a new ending, a new opportunity or a new life lesson – painful or cheerful.  It gives us the choice to stay on a path that may or may not be working or beneficial or the option of fixing a previous mistake, failure, bad decision or choice or accepting responsibility for our life as it is unfolding.

Life has given me many second chances – some I embraced and many I ignored but in the end they all came into my life for a reason – to help me get wiser in some way – to teach me something I needed to learn and to help me to let go of ego, arrogance, insecurity, immaturity or any number of emotional, financial, relationship and/or career behaviors that in the end, if they didn’t change, would have come to a negative conclusion in some way.

Risk, uncertainty, and change in our life circumstances can not be avoided sooner or later.  We all must face some unknowns and do the best we can with them given our education, history etc.  But in the end, we will all make some dumb decisions or choices, it’s who we are.  But life is seldom final.  It helps us, if and when we are ready, to improve, grow, change, adjust etc. and learn from our mistakes, failures and bad choices or decisions.

But, life also will not prevent us from experiencing the lessons or consequences of these actions, choices or behaviors as this is one of life’s ways of helping us learn, grow and change.  But, it still gives us a choice.  Life says, “Learn from this or you will continue to bear the consequences of these actions until you do.  I am giving you a second chance.  Don’t blow this one.”

When fear of change, risk or uncertainty rules our life we close ourselves off too many of life’s opportunities and blessings.

However, we must not see second chances as simply a way to escape from lessons that need to be learned.

So, you are in a dead-end job going nowhere and a previous employer offers you a new position with more income and no hard feelings about the way you previously left.  Take it or not – that is the question.

A previous spouse wants to try again to make it work this time and they say they forgive you your transgressions.  Say yes or no?

Life is filled with these types of options and choices – so what do we do?  I can’t tell you how to approach second chances – all I can tell you is what I have learned.  Sometimes they work out well and sometimes they don’t, so how do we know which road to follow?

-Listen to your gut. Ask yourself – what really feels right?  What makes sense? What would I do if I was smarter, wiser, younger, older, poorer, richer – get it?  Just keep asking yourself questions and I will guarantee sooner or later the answer will come – do it, don’t do it, wait, get more information before you decide or some other approach that often seems to come from nowhere.

Sooner or alter we all get a second chance so the question is not whether we have one or deserve one but what do we do with it?

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