Potential: Use it or Lose it

The older you get, the less value potential has in your life.  It’s like a battery, or a pile of rocks on the castle wall.  If you never put the battery in something, that energy is completely wasted.  Same for the pile of rocks – if you don’t drop them on the heads of unsuspecting invaders, you’ve labored in vain to put them up there.  (Please note, I’m note arguing against defensive preparations, just using heavy physical objects for an example as a nod to science’s potential energy vs. kinetic energy.)

I may have the science wrong, it’s been many years since Mr. Wagner tried to teach me anything about physics.  I refused to learn.  Things escalated so far that I dropped the course and went back to the “new and improved” earth science.  I liked Mr. Wagner, he taught me chemistry, but I did not like physics.

Let’s go back to potential in your life.  When you are young, potential is a great thing.  The more you have, the better.  It gives you choices.  You can add to your potential.  Great stuff.  But when you get out into the world, you have to start using it.  For some folks, that’s tough.  Using potential means you don’t have as much anymore.  Fewer choices.  But along with few choices comes more accomplishments.  And accomplishment creates more potential.

Ask anyone who has had work done on their home.  Is it better to have a crew that is capable of doing good work or a crew that is doing great work?  I suspect that you have far more potential than you think.  Use it.  Live up to what you are capable of being.  There is a parable in the Bible about a wealthy lord who leaves town and entrusts a portion of his treasure to three servants.  When he returns, he interviews them one by one.  To the first he gave 5 billion dollars.  The servant invested it and returned 10 billion to the master.  The second he gave 3 billion dollars.  That servant also invested it and returned 6 billion to the master.  To the third servant he gave 1 billion dollars.  That servant returned the 1 billion to the master upon his return saying, “I know you are a hard master and would hold me accountable for each dollar so I buried to keep it safe.”  The master was furious.  “You wasted it.  Even if you had only put it in the bank I would have earned interest.  Instead you did nothing.”  The servant cringed.  Then the master said, “Give his billion to the one who has 10.  He has proven himself faithful.”  (Or something very close to that.)

What’s the point?  DO SOMETHING WITH YOUR POTENTIAL other than burying it.  You’ll find that you keep getting more.