TODAY’S TONIC: The universe has no restrictions. By Bishop Duke Akamisoko

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The universe has no restrictions. You place restrictions on the universe with your expectations. Do one thing every day that scares you. I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it. Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. If you are not willing to risk the unusual, you will have to settle for the ordinary. There is only one way to avoid criticism: Do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing. There’s something liberating about not pretending. Dare to embarrass yourself. Risk. If you don’t build your dream, someone else will hire you to help them build theirs. You don’t concentrate on risks. You concentrate on results. No risk is too great to prevent the necessary job from getting done. The first step toward success is taken when you refuse to be a captive of the environment in which you first find yourself. Always go with your passions. Never ask yourself if it’s realistic or not. Creative people who can’t help but explore other mental territories are at greater risk, just as someone who climbs a mountain is more at risk than someone who just walks along a village lane. You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something–your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.The most important thing to remember is this: to be ready at any moment to give up what you are for what you might become. Leap and the net will appear. Often the difference between a successful man and a failure is not one’s better abilities or ideas, but the courage that one has to bet on his ideas, to take a calculated risk, and to act. I don’t think you’re human if you don’t get nervous. There can be no vulnerability without risk. There can be no community without vulnerability. There can be no peace, and ultimately no life, without community. A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for. Our lives improve only when we take chances, and the first and most difficult risk we can take is to be honest with ourselves. Think big and don’t listen to people who tell you it can’t be done. Life’s too short to think small. You’ve got to keep fighting; you’ve got to risk your life every six months to stay alive. I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed. Because if you’re prepared and you know what it takes, it’s not a risk. You just have to figure out how to get there. There is always a way to get there. When you take risks you learn that there will be times when you succeed and there will be times when you fail, and both are equally important. To dare is to lose one’s footing momentarily. To not dare is to lose oneself. Don’t be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better. The time to take counsel of your fears is before you make an important battle decision. That’s the time to listen to every fear you can imagine! When you have collected all the facts and fears and made your decision, turn off all your fears and go ahead! Many a man is praised for his reserve and so-called shyness when he is simply too proud to risk making a fool of himself. Often the difference between a successful person and a failure is not one has better abilities or ideas, but the courage that one has to bet on one’s ideas, to take a calculated risk–and to act. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might has well not have lived at all, in which case you have failed by default. The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinions of others, for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth. Don’t worry about failures, worry about the chances you miss when you don’t even try. Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do, so throw off the bowlines, sail away from safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore, dream, discover. When you play it too safe, you’re taking the biggest risk of your life. Time is the only wealth we’re given. Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear. Screw it, Let’s do it.You can’t have everything you want, but you can have the things that really matter to you.lTrust your own instinct. Your mistakes might as well be your own, instead of someone else’s.
I am thankful for all of those who said NO to me. It’s because of them I’m doing it myself. Only those who play win. Only those who risk win. History favors risk-takers. Forgets the timid. Everything else is commentary. The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me. Risk more than others think is safe. Care more than others think is wise. Dream more than others think is practical. Expect more than others think is possible.
Have an amazing day!
Bishop DukeAkamisoko