“You act like mortals in all that you fear, and like immortals in all that you desire. … How late it is to begin really to live just when life must end! How stupid to forget our mortality, and put off sensible plans to our fiftieth and sixtieth years, aiming to begin life from a point at which few have arrive!” –Seneca
Sometimes just when you think you are leading life in the best way possible, you are taken aback by its immensity and are left gaping at everything you are yet to witness and experience. And yet for some others, life is still veiled like a beautiful bride, mysterious, standing tall in all her chastity. The latter are yet to enjoy the bliss that life can present to those who have lived it. Why wait then? What holds us back from plunging headlong into this beautiful ocean called life? Is it the ideas or the lack of them there of?
Ideas are wonderful. Powerful. Indestructible. They come like a thief in the night, quietly and suddenly, when you least expect it. Their manifestation is a seed that plants itself so firmly in your mind that, rest assured, despite your best efforts to rid your mind of it, a magical beanstalk will finally emerge from it for which you will one day be thankful.
But what makes these ideas epiphanies?
Is it the suddenness of their arrival? Or their ability to stir you?
Let us assume, for the purpose of discussion, that it is both.
Epiphanies are a turning point in one’s life. They do come suddenly, and without warning. An epiphany could be anything – a thought that makes you want to quit smoking, an idea to set up your own café, a realisation that you need to become a dancer. The sudden burst of realisation comes from within. And it becomes quite clear as to why, when you afford epiphanies a thought – they take shape inside you, being as they are a part of who you are, what you deeply desire, and a little bit of your very own identity.
Epiphanies, much like ideas and revelations, stir you. They drive you, motivate you, and sometimes even push you into the deep end, and expect you to swim your way to success. That’s what makes a moment of epiphany worth building on. An epiphany gives you a clear shot of your target board, and makes you sharpen your darts. The simplest example, perhaps, is that of the idea of Harry Potter simply ‘walking into’ J K Rowling’s head. Had she disregarded it, the crown of Literature would’ve missed out on a gem. But epiphanies are hard to ignore. They prod, poke and persist until they are given undivided attention. In Rowling’s case, her twenty-four year old self was an epiphany, for it was she who thought up a fantasy world and refused to let go.
Isn’t it time to pull up the socks and start chasing the running minute? Isn’t it time to release the anchor that is holding you down from what you truly desire? Isn’t it time to begin to really live? All it takes is an act on your part.
It’s never too late to take a detour and follow your heart’s trail. Epiphanies strike you not every day and when they do, awake to them; rise up to the moment of consciousness because you are worth it, and because you are designed for it.
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