Hatch Those Eggs!

Let’s examine the relationship between a farmer and his hen. Let’s call them Jim and Carry.

Carry, the hen, is given a lot of freedom by the farmer to do what she likes but she knows that what he really wants from her is eggs. That is the purpose of her existence after all.

Jim loves Carry dearly. He’s taken care of her since she was a baby hen and the time has now come for her to start hatching eggs as well. Return on investment, if you will.

But, Carry isn’t hatching eggs. And Jim can’t tell why. She seems to be playing around with the other hens, doing all the things a normal hen would do and even eating as much as the other hens. And then, one day, Carry does actually lay some eggs but in all her zeal to make sure they survive, she doesn’t let them out of her grasp. She can’t fail this time after all! What would the other hens think?

She practically sits on them till they suffocate and die. This happens  few times and finally, an exasperated Jim stops expecting eggs from Carry and a now exasperated Carry stops expecting chickens from herself.

All this pent up anger results in her getting annoyed with the other hens that are hatching eggs and living a normal life. She always has a mean word or two to say. Over time, she finds company in a couple of other hens as well who have gotten too used to a life of entitlement. And in time, Carry died as well. But, there was really no hen or person who cared.. Why would anybody care? What did she give the world?
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Now, let’s for a moment replace Carry with ourselves, Jim with the world and the other hens as other people. It is likely we have been invested a lot in as well. And it is likely we have many ideas on what we can do as well. But, initially, we don’t act upon them. All we see from ourselves are excuses. 

Now, many excuses later, we almost can’t deny some great ideas we have energy for. These ideas would likely require us to do  more – to volunteer at that not-for-profit after work or to start our own company doing e-commerce after our day job or offer a service online for free just because we look doing or to blog or to study further or to learn a language. Very exciting ideas waiting to be executed. But, no, we sit on the with more excuses and obstinacy. We don’t give them the space they require to grow. We don’t try anything because we feel it will only increase our chances of failure.

And finally, they die.

Over time, we get used to the idea that ‘some’ people can do more and we just can’t. And life goes on, as we know it. We are likely to be bitter about not doing it.. but hey, that’s what we’re meant to do, isn’t it?

No.

Hatch those eggs! Give them a chance to survive. Put some effort into nurturing them. Fail. Laugh. Do again. Pay attention only to those who encourage. Do. As JLM put it, most people are not be impressed by what they did in 1 year, but very impressed about what they did in 5. Put in the effort. There are many eggs within you waiting to be hatched. Make them count.

To know and not to do is not to know.

Hatch those eggs!