Are you embracing risk or running from it?

“We all take risks if we’re really alive.”

I must have read this one sentence eight times and then I read it out loud to my hubby. This quote is from a Nora Roberts novel I recently read.

The main characters are a doctor and a businessman who is building his empire by buying unproven new companies and those that are failing.

The doctor says, “But you can’t be sure all the companies you buy will make it.” He agrees, they won’t all make it, he tells her, “That’s the game.”

She thinks it’s a vicious game.

But he says, “Maybe; it’s life.” He points out that a doctor knows all her patients won’t make it, but it doesn’t stop her from taking a new one. “We all take risks,” he says, “if we’re really alive.”

I think for everyone the definition of risk and the comfort level involved with risk is different in degree and feel. As a business owner and farm owner with my hubby, I’m super comfortable with this type of risk. Others wouldn’t be.

But it’s the personal family relationships that feel my riskiest. I never want to be in conflict, cause pain, or be estranged from those I love. This is an unrealistic view with the fear of loss at the root. This view assumes I have control over what someone else feels, says, or does. I don’t. This fear causes me to behave in a way that isn’t natural and actually stifles relationships creating the risk I so fear.  

I think everything about life offers opportunities for risk, from the financial investments you may make, the conversations you have, the transportation you use, the clothes you wear, the food you eat, the location you live in, the people you love, and the relationships you create.

I think the reason I’m so taken with that statement about risk is because it’s given me a perspective I hadn’t considered before. Not fully. At least not mindfully.

Every time I tried to minimize risk because of the fear of losing something, it cost me so much more. Whether it was avoiding a difficult conversation for fear of uncomfortable conflict, staying at a job past my interest for the security of a paycheck, or not listening to my intuition in favor of pleasing someone else.

All the risks I didn’t take because of fear ended up costing me the very thing I was afraid of in the first place. Bottom line, it made my world smaller, less interesting, less alive, and less brave.

When I embrace risk there is a quality to my life I hadn’t thought about before—I feel more alive, more engaged, and in the end, more empowered to be authentically me. I’m not tiptoeing around and hiding in a corner somewhere trying to resist, minimize, or avoid what life offers.

Living life fully engaged as who we are can seem risky. There are no guarantees on how something might turn out or how someone might treat us. But we can either enthusiastically take life up on what it offers and move forward, or end up atrophying stuck in one place. 

My goal is to be fully alive and aware of life’s gifts and try to act on them without fear. It feels like it’s worth the risk. What risk are you willing to take to be fully alive?

And as always, I’m available for private sessions if you need deeper understanding, support, or guidance in the form of energy work or intuitive life coaching. Click this link to schedule.