Visionless

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “People only see what they are prepared to see.” Unfortunately, this is the problem for far too many of us and most of the time we don’t even know it. We can easily become blinded by a lack of vision, just as swiftly as we can become blinded by the the opposite end of the spectrum, which manifests itself in something we call greed. Therefore, the correct path is neither one in which we are blind and unmotivated, nor is it one where we want everything we see, but it lies between these two extremes.

I recently overheard a motivational speaker make reference to being visionless, hence the inspiration for this post. He said something to the effect that without vision, we can be led anywhere by anyone and that certainly can’t be a good thing. So, how does one prevent this from happening? Well, as he put it, we obviously need to have a vision in life. Some people call it a master plan, others call it a goal. To keep it simple, let’s just say it is something we have set our sights on and it is something we eagerly want to accomplish.

Whether our vision is short-term or long-term doesn’t matter as much as one might assume. What matters is that we have a vision in the first place, which is sort of like a defense against those people and things which seek to lead us astray. Our vision probably will evolve over time, and to manage it, we usually want to break it up into smaller chunks which could be actualized now rather than later. These are the stepping stones which will carry us to our destination, but only if we follow them.

In short, just as we seldom get into a car without knowing where we are going, we shouldn’t go through life without having a destination either. While there will still be some speed bumps and we might even break down on the side of the road, at least we will be moving towards our goal and constantly working to make progress. Eventually we will get there and when we do, we will appreciate it that much more.