‘Opportunity Does not Knock Twice’ is Half a Truth!

Do you know the one time when there is lots of hope all over the world? It happens across the world each year, it is a phenomenon! Nope, it’s not a religious holiday. I am not talking about Easter, neither am I talking about Christmas.

It’s not an American Holiday, so I am not talking about Thanksgiving. I am not talking about Eid. But there is this one day where people from all walks of life, young and old, in all the continents around the world share an unprecedented moment of hope.

You guessed it. It is the new year’s day. Each year celebrations are carried around the world like no other day. People count down the minutes and seconds together. Never mind that Australia always does that ahead of everybody else, but the rest of the world joins religiously few hours later.

Have you ever asked yourself why this is the case? Have you ever asked yourself why there is so much inspiration at the beginning of the year to plan, resolve, dream and envision greatness?

There is just one answer to that question. The only problem we have is that we do this just once a year. Think of all the positive energy that we generate when we are celebrating crossing over, starting over another year once again? Think of all the hope that we give ourselves when we get this psychological start. You would think that January 1st has a different color from the other days!

The truth however is that it has the same value as the previous day…and the next day. It does not have less hours…or more hours. It does not have a different make up to it, it is the same as yesterday and tomorrow.

The reason as to why we all celebrate is simple. We have just allowed ourselves another opportunity to:

• Be better,
• Start over,
• Dare,
• Achieve a dream
• Dream a dream
• Make it right

…and so on.

The fact of life is that all the days of our lives, we will have those moments when things do not go the way they are supposed to…or at least the way we planned them to. We have an option here….or at least two options.

First, we can stick it out with what we are doing…trudge along with the negative results that we are getting while afraid to count the costs and change the strategy…

Second, we can accept the reality on the ground, wave the white flag of surrender and declare another ‘new years’ day with an opportunity to start over…this time round with better information!

Some people will tell you that opportunity never knocks twice…well they are just ‘motivating’ you to grab chances when they show up, but they are wrong! Human beings are alive today primarily because of millions upon millions of ‘second chances!’

When you hit a crisis, you can call it quits…or you can embrace the newness of the moment to start over again. This way, we can give ourselves hope at any moment that a crisis hits us. They say that a crisis has two meanings:

1. Danger
2. Opportunity

Sadly most people look at the danger and fail to notice the opportunity.

It is my admonition that you would look at your crisis with the reality it serves you today, but also endeavor to embrace the new opportunity it affords you to start over.

How you can do that is another story…in fact, it’s a whole book titled ‘Setbacks to Comebacks’ coming out

at the end of the year.

Do you believe in second chances?