Impossible is nothing.

My whole entire life, I never had money problems, relationship problems, or any other problems at all – except for ONE. The one that has been chasing me relentlessly wherever I went, all the time.

A perception problem!

I believe I have found a possible solution to the one lately.

But first, let me tell you something else.

I remember not long ago, I was telling the following story to someone close. The story was all about perception. It was ment to be more of a perception test to that person, rather than just a story, actually.  Anyway, here goes.

Late one very stormy night, imagine that you‘re driving down the empty streets of  town in your fancy little two-seater sports car. As you stop at a red light, you notice there is a bus stop where three people are waiting.

One is an old lady who seems to be in some kind of severe distress and appears as if she’s about to die!

Another is an old friend of yours – who once saved your life!

And the third is your soul mate! Here stands the very one and only you’ve seen in your dreams countless times and waited and hoped for all your life!

Now, knowing there can be only one passenger in your car, which one of these three people will you offer a ride to? This is a moral and ethical dilemma that was actually included as part of a job application, supposedly. I’ve learned this from my UCLA Anderson classes I took years ago.

Alright. You could pick up the elderly woman in distress, because she‘s going to die if you don‘t help. Thus, you should obviously help save her first.

Or, you could take your old friend because, after all, he saved your life once and here’s your perfect opportunity to pay him back.

But then, how can you possibly throw away this one unbelievably rare opportunity to finally meet your soul mate? How can you let this once-in-a-lifetime chance go by?

Wow! What a dilemma! So what decision will your perception lead you to make?

Okay, perhaps you want to ponder this true test in YOUR perception for awhile. No problem, do so. And I’ll tell you some other thing in the meantime, if you will.

I am on recovery from something real tough that never occurred to me before, an emotional near-death experience virtually. Being in the rambling mood therefore, oftentimes.

Yesterday I felt like tasting some good old and fair western world for a change. So I found and finally opened for the first time this 50 classic movie box I got from someone years ago. Randomly took out one disc, sat down with a cup of nice java and watched.

Something very enlightening has struck me in the process.

The film was a western story where sheriff rides out into the hills to catch the outlaw. And the outlaw sees the sheriff coming at a distance. And the whole movie – (read if you will: our whole lives) – the whole movie is taken up with how the sheriff pursues the outlaw, and the little tricks that the outlaw plays to elude the sheriff; like riding in circles, playing all kinds of tricks to throw him off the trail etc.

Until after 90 minutes or so of the movie – (and maybe years in the actual conditions of our lives) – the outlaw sits down somewhere, and he begins to think: „It just isn‘t worth running anymore. This is freedom?“

The physical body is free. Of course the outlaw is free physically; he can go north, east, south, west. He is free. But he isn‘t. Something is chasing him relentlessly, wherever he goes, all the time. Something that won‘t stop until he gets tired of running.

You already know what happens next, don‘t you? He finally admits to himself the futility of depending upon his own tricky devices to elude and escape the sheriff. He can‘t escape. And neither can you and I.

Now in the movie story, the outlaw finally sits down. And he sees that it‘s no life at all. So he just sits down by his campfire and the sheriff comes riding down. He has his gun ready, but it isn‘t drawn. Because it‘s a wordless scene now. And the outlaw looks up at the sheriff on his horse, coming into the little campsite there. And the sheriff looks down, and they both understand. And the sheriff puts ropes around his hands and takes him on back to town.

But the best is yet to come. And I am telling you – this is a true story of your life and mine, too. It‘s just taking place in the western scene out there...

Here‘s the best part of OUR STORY. The sheriff finally takes the outlaw back into town, and when he gets there, they find out that the governor has pardoned him.

A long journey of worry and fear of what‘s going to happen to you when you finally get back to town. And to your surprise, when you get there, because you have done what is right, you have followed the psychological rule of giving up and letting go, you get the reward of that which you didn‘t know existed and which you can‘t know exists until you receive it.

What a terrific story this is!

So. Let‘s stop running from the sheriff! Let‘s stop suffering, will we?

Okay folks, ready with your solution to the perception test I gave you above? So what is YOUR perception telling you? Well, I‘ll tell you which answer the winning job candidate came up with. Here it is;

„I would give the car keys to my old friend and let him take the lady to the hospital. Then I would stay behind and wait for the bus with my newfound soul mate – the woman of my dreams!“

See? Isn‘t it fantastic? An entirely new world opens to us when we give up our old, habitual, rigid thinking process that keeps us trapped, frustrated, and limited.

So the next time, and all the time from now on, what if you took on the mindset that said: „When I don‘t know what to do (or fear doing something), I take a bold step - a leap - forward and let my actions in the real world teach me, what I can and can‘t do, what‘s possible and what isn‘t?“ What would start to happen to your definition of failure and success then, to your perception of things that seemed to be impossible once?

Impossible is nothing – remember the massive Adidas worldwide campaign using this quote?

Do you know true meaning behind it? Can you perceive it?

Nothing is impossible, because the word itself says, „I‘m possible“!

Which leads me to my newfound solution to my perception problem that has been chasing me so relentlessly all my life.

From now on, instead of pondering „Why is this happening TO me?“ I am starting to ask and ponder, „Why is this happening FOR me?“

And it‘s a whole different world I'm in.

Gosh. March already here... Can‘t wait for this year‘s spring, I swear.

Take care, everyone!

Tom