Avoiding Invisible Obstacles

When I was a Boy Scout, we played a game when new Scouts joined the troop. We lined up chairs in a pattern, creating an obstacle course through which the new Scouts, blindfolded, were supposed to maneuver. The scoutmaster gave them a few moments to study the pattern before our adventure began. But as soon as the victims were blindfolded, the rest of us quietly removed the chairs. I think life is like this game. Perhaps we spend our lives avoiding obstacles we have created for ourselves and in reality exist only in our minds. We’re afraid to apply for that job, take violin lessons, learn a foreign language, call an old friend, write our congressman—whatever it is that we would really like to do but don’t because of personal obstacles. Don’t avoid any chairs until you run smack into one. And if you do, at least you’ll have a place to sit down. —Pierce Vincent Eckhart