A long time ago, there lived a lonely idea named “Possibility” (a beautiful name indeed everyone would say). She was lonely because at the time, no one ever took her very seriously and no one wanted to be seen playing with her because she was always tempting and taunting people with thoughts of promise and desire. Not to mention the fact she was always trying to rouse the status quo and rival the way things ought to be.
On the other hand, it was her big brother “Knowledge” that everyone wanted to get close to. He was tall and very handsome and filled with brash confidence. Knowledge always had the safe, right answers and never challenged the status quo, mainly because he enjoyed the egoic “high” of righteousness, agreement and praise. In fact, when possibility was very young her mother even told her: “You’re brother Knowledge is the smart one my dear, you are the playful imaginative one. He is the one everyone respects and listens to.”
As the years went on and Possibility matured she became more and more frustrated and even a little jealous that her brother Knowledge got all the glory while she was always treated with little regard. “Why listen to Possibility when you’ve got factual Knowledge to guide you” the townspeople would say.
One morning, Possibility woke up feeling very frisky and very alive. Her dreams that night were filled with all kinds of fantasies and new ideas. And for the first time ever, she dreamed she was flying! After gobbling up some fresh thoughts for breakfast she begin to write down a fantastic idea. Page after page, she wrote and wrote, franticly developing an extraordinary, unbelievable, impossible, totally unrealistic, status quo buster of an idea. A little mischievous perhaps because it went against everything her brother believed in, and therefore would certainly go against what everyone else believed in too. Nevertheless possibility “knew” this idea would work and was determined to once and for all be taken seriously.
After many months developing and perfecting her idea, it was finally ready to be put to the test. She called on her trusted cousin “Fate” with explicit instructions to deliver a certain message to exactly 100 unsuspecting, unassuming, clear thinking, normal, run-of-the-mill, could care less, human beings, of all colors, all religions, all nationalities, and to both sexes. At the very same time, on the very same day, at the very same hour. So Fate, being the much younger and more naive of the two cousins began whispering possibilities mysterious message to exactly 100 unsuspecting, unassuming, clear thinking, normal, run-of-the-mill, could care less, human beings, of all colors, all religions, all nationalities, and to both sexes. At the very same time, on the very same day, at the very same hour. Here’s what the message of Possibility said: “You can fly!”
So, the idea of flying appeared one sunny day in the minds of exactly 100 unassuming human beings at the very same time, on the very same day, at the very same hour.
For the next many years, these 100 messengers could often be found in the company of their friends excitedly sharing their fantastic ideas of the possibility of flying. And their friends and families would laugh uproariously and taunt them for thinking such wild crazy thoughts. They would always say “Knowledge” said it was absolutely, positively impossible for a heaver than air object to lift itself off the ground…unless of course it was a bird!” and that such foolish thoughts should be confined to insane asylums and places for the mentally challenged. And even as those brave men and courageous boys began strapping wings of wire and paper on to their backs and jumping off bridges in an attempt to prove they could fly, there were clusters of cameras rolling and hundreds of cracking flash bulbs exploding in the faces of the unassuming pilots to be. As the reporters scrambled and dashed to get their stories on the front pages of newspapers and magazines everywhere: “Another Birdman Crashes In Defeat!”
Nevertheless, all around the world the possibility of man’s ability to fly began to slowly take off. And before you knew it even men with knowledge and righteousness began to embrace the idea of flying (with the help of Physics and Finance of course). Until finally, many years after the message of possibility was first whispered to those 100 unsuspecting human beings, Orville and Wilbur made Possibilities dream come true. And on December 3, 1904 took her for the ride of her life—they took her flying! And from that day forward all the townspeople began to take “Possibility” very seriously.
The most noteworthy thing here to me, are those brave men and courageous boys who strapped wings of wire and paper on their backs and jumped off bridges in an attempt to prove they could fly. Those guys absolutely knew that they were being ridiculed and laughed at in the press. And they knew their children were being teased at school and their families were being socially chastised. Yet they did it anyway. Because they believed in the “possibility” of flying. And although they couldn’t prove they could fly, they could know it! And they courageously tossed aside all thoughts of righteous knowledge and soared upward, rocketing their dreams as high as they could take them.
I respect the guys who actually ended up flying. However, I honor the guys that went before them, who only got the laughs, never the glory.
Has fate ever whispered a possibility in your ear that seemed impossible, but you went for it anyway?