I get an email every weekday morning from “the universe.” Some of them say just the right thing on just the right day. Some … meh.
Today’s tied in to a post that I had a skeleton for already and decided to use the inspiration to fill it in.
“Performing miracles, Heat, isn’t a matter of doing the impossible, it’s a matter of redefining the possible.”
Running a mile in four minutes is an easy example. It was impossible, but once it was done, it was replicated hundreds of times. It’s not easy (and man, that’s fast!), but over 1400 men have done it so far. They just needed permission.
Another that comes to mind for me is climbing the Dawn Wall. In the last year, I saw the movie by the same name (on Netflix—watch it!) and read Tommy Caldwell’s book (The Push) about it. It’s a 3000-foot rock face in Yosemite, a place renowned for climbing. This particular bit of rock had never been free climbed and was considered unclimbable.
Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson free climbed it in 19 days (after years of working on it). Not long after, it was climbed in eight days. It went from unclimbable to climbed to climbed in less than half the time in under a year.
Of course, this has application all over life, not just in elite athletics.
Women, people of color, queers are breaking barriers all over the place, which on one hand, is excellent! It’s about time!
On the other hand, it’s not cool or neat or fun that there are so many firsts for women, people of color, non-Christians, queer people. Because it’s 20 freaking 19.
But it does ask the question: what are we “not able” to do just because it hasn’t been done yet?