My favourite Mr Men character when I was little (and now) is Mr Impossible – who does impossible things. All the time. I love it when people do preposterous things – I love it when they break free of impossibility and just do it anyway.
Because so many of us decide that something is inconceivable for us, when it really is totally possible. What have you decided is impossible for you? For example, could you earn a million? Could you run a marathon? Could you start your own business? Could you have a loving relationship? Let me ask it in a different way: what can’t you do? What is impossible in your life? What limitations and restrictions have you put on yourself?
Yes, I said what limitations have you put on yourself… The only limitations you have are the limitations you put on yourself. The things you decide are impossible…and therefore make them unachievable – not because you CAN’T do them, not because they are impossible, but because you don’t try. Because you give up. Climbing a mountain, starting a business, running a marathon…all possible if you give yourself the chance.
Lots of people have done impossible things. A black south african president? Unimaginable. Nelson Mandela did it. Flight? Absurd. Most of us have done it! Me start a business/write an ebook/lose 3 stone/walk a marathon? Impossible. I’ve done all those things. The 4 minute mile…preposterous. Roger Bannister did it…then loads of other people did it too! Walking on the moon. Impossible. Neil Armstrong and co all did it. Breathing underwater. Unworkable. Tell that to the thousands of scuba divers across the world right now.
Most of us think in terms of why we can’t do something. My clients often tell me the obstacles in the way of them doing something. Some of them are real, many of them are imaginary. Some of them are so ridiculous that even they wonder why that is stopping them! Think of something that you would like to do, but ‘can’t’. Something you’ve decided isn’t possible.
Now ask yourself ‘what if I could?’ ‘What if it was possible?’ What if your dream to write/be self employed/run a marathon/marry in vegas (!) WAS possible? People who successfully do all the things that are impossible do ONE thing differently. They question that thought that it is not possible. They ask what if instead of dismissing it as impossible. And then they go and take some action towards it.
Nelson Mandela himself said “It always seems impossible until it’s done” – and that’s true. The idea that I would walk 26 miles, or go backpacking, or run my own business was utterly inconceivable until I did…and then I wondered why I’d thought they were impossible because they were easy. Ish. Well, I did them anyway. 3 times, for a year, and for nearly a decade! I get that it’s hard to believe in the impossible being possible, so strengthen your ‘believing in the impossible muscles’:
“Alice laughed. ‘There’s no use trying,’ she said. ‘One can’t believe impossible things.’
I daresay you haven’t had much practice,’ said the Queen. ‘When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
Start believing in the absurd, take action towards the improbable and maybe you could be Mr (or Miss) Impossible, and do some impossilbe things of your own?
Love
Donna.x