Chances

I used to think that opportunities and chances were one and the same, and I never felt like there was a difference between one or the other, but over the past several months, I've come to redefine them in my own terms. Opportunities were things I was presented with not because of some lucky coincidence, but because I had worked toward earning it, while chances always have the connotation of being some random lucky draw you just so happened to win.

...something that when you try and wrap a definition around it, seems to be a circumstance that you're unsure about - never knowing it was there, not knowing if anything will come of it, unable to determine whether it is for good or ill, but available to you nonetheless.

These past few months I've seized on many of the chances I've been given, and although they haven't all turned out as I had hoped, I'm glad I took them. I've noticed the older I get, the less they seem to occur, and thus I make the best effort I can...but it brings me to a question.

I see and know how difficult it is to give someone a chance and why it is so, but it still doesn't stop me from asking myself "Why not?"

Why not allow me to prove that I can do a job better than anybody else you will find? Why not trust your instincts instead of what's written on a piece of paper or what's not?

Why not give me a chance to get to know you and vice-versa? Why not trust your heart instead of what's written on your brain or what's not?

...And so I've learned that chances are not something you earn, but something you are given, not because you deserve one and not because it's your due, but because of a feeling, an inkling, that perhaps something good or something great may come of it, and you, and someone is willing to take that risk to see it come to fruition.

I'm not currently in a position to give chances to anybody concerning a job or career, but I try and make a valiant effort to do the best I can in the other aspect - to let go of my reservations, take someone as they are, and take the time to find out who that is...because at the end of the day, when you ask yourself "How do you know who, what, or how someone is?", the answer is...you don't...so I give most everyone a chance to get to know me, and I only hope for the same in return. I often find myself pleasantly surprised, sometimes forever grateful, or at worst, slightly disappointed.

At the end of the day, it's up to each one of us to determine whether we are willing to open ourselves to that risk of disappointment in order to see what rewards we may receive, or if we'd rather be safe and secure in our current state of being. I only hope that I am lucky enough in my near future to receive more undeserved and unqualified, but definitely not unappreciated, chances to prove myself - in life, and in love.