Reminds me of a singular experience I had several years ago. I'd been driving pizza delivery and in general coasting through life after dropping out of college. I had wanted to be a programmer when I grew up but a personality conflict between myself and the head of the CS department at school convinced me to hit the bricks.
Anyway I was doing a delivery to a local apartment complex on a windy day and on my way back to the car this little pink piece of paper blew across the parking lot and fetched up next to my shoe. I picked it up and inspected it. It was printed on both sides, one side had some kind of spam advertisement for carpet cleaning or real estate or something, but the other side caught my eye. All it said was "If you want something you've never had, you have to do something you've never done".
While it would make a great narrative to say I went back and quit my dead end job immediately and dedicated myself to getting my shit together, it was another year before I started putting my life in order. But ever since that day, whenever I felt like I was in a rut or whatever, I'd remember that little piece of paper.
Eventually I got my shit together, educated myself on a couple of programming languages and joined the workforce as a developer, married, bought a house. While I don't think that piece of paper is solely responsible for my successes, the idea "If you want something you've never had, you have to do something you've never done" has been kicking around in my head ever since, and I'm sure it's colored at least some of the choices I've made since that day.
Anyway I was doing a delivery to a local apartment complex on a windy day and on my way back to the car this little pink piece of paper blew across the parking lot and fetched up next to my shoe. I picked it up and inspected it. It was printed on both sides, one side had some kind of spam advertisement for carpet cleaning or real estate or something, but the other side caught my eye. All it said was "If you want something you've never had, you have to do something you've never done".
While it would make a great narrative to say I went back and quit my dead end job immediately and dedicated myself to getting my shit together, it was another year before I started putting my life in order. But ever since that day, whenever I felt like I was in a rut or whatever, I'd remember that little piece of paper.
Eventually I got my shit together, educated myself on a couple of programming languages and joined the workforce as a developer, married, bought a house. While I don't think that piece of paper is solely responsible for my successes, the idea "If you want something you've never had, you have to do something you've never done" has been kicking around in my head ever since, and I'm sure it's colored at least some of the choices I've made since that day.