Time and Chance

...But Time and Chance Happened To Them All. - Ecclesiastes I started this piece as far back as 2010 only with the caption - Time and Chance. By the way, I have literaly been on sabathical and not posted anything substantial for about a decade.(I am ashamed of myself but happy I am rediscovering me). Fast forward to 2020, I realised that at the time, I did not even understand what 'Time and Chance' meant Now, I am caught between what I must have wanted to write then and what life has thought me so far. 'Time and Chance' indeed happened and have deepened my perspective of life and all its 'happenstances'. While, I don't think I have changed much, albeit, I have experienced much and evolved even in ways I couldn't have imagined; some great and some not so great. let's just say life has a way of happening. Through it all, I realised that life presents opportunities (chances) at different points through experiences and encounters, sometimes disguised as shitty. I decided to do a search on the meaning of the word 'Chance' and found that 'Chance' (Opportunity) is a set of circumstances that make it possible for something to happen. Chance has an element of time in it. Therefore Chance is an Opportune time. Often times, we do not recognise 'Chance' because our perspective (call it frame of reference, point of view or how we interpret life) blurs our ability to look beyond self and consider the many related dimensions that may present itself as a potential 'chance'. Sometimes we are deeply preoccupied with our standpoint, that we loose sight of the chance to learn, do better, be supportive, create, listen, connect, teach, mentor, shine, sell etc. Issues of life, circumstances and struggles have happened and should note be blamed, neither should we remain as victims. I belong to the school of thought that 'everything happens for a reason' perhaps because this philosophy cushions my threshold and helps me deal with situations. While the reason may not be tenable, sensible, relatable, clear, material and may even be unknown, fact remains that there is always an embedded chance for growth. Apart from Perspective, There are times we even recognise 'chance' but fail to take it due to self sabotaging and self limiting beliefs. That thought of being inadequate hampers a lot of people from shooting their shots at life. Imagine how many times we have stopped short of achieving and only walked by the edge of greatness just because we undermine our abilities and potentials. Remember "the race is not to the swift, nor battle to the strong, nor riches to men of understanding, nor favour to men of skill; but Time and Chance happen to them all" but for the ones who recognise and dare to take chances. How many times in life have we been presented with 'Time and Chances? and failed to recognise it because of our limiting frame of reference, self sabotage and lack of preparation? I am not even pointing fingers because I have personally missed many chances due to these reasons. Lack of personal growth and achievement is partly due to our lack of preparedness in anticipating the 'time and chance' life presents to us, our personal biases and lack of faith in ourselves. Thus, Time and Chance is not a concept of random occurences but right happenings enabled by an out of the box thinking, beleif in oneself and a dose of preparation.