Embracing your Villains
With every great hero comes a great villain. The bigger the villain, the bigger the hero called forth to face it. In fact, the villain’s role is to challenge the hero to grow or perish.
At times, your villain can be an illness, a disability, a co-worker, a boss, a bully, a competing company, a spouse, a sibling, disempowering beliefs, dream-stompers or a woman named Wendy Allen.
The phone company gave me a rare gift when I moved years ago—an easy to remember phone number. In the weeks following the move, however, an onslaught of incessant telemarketing calls gushed in daily.
After hanging up on telemarketers for weeks, I eventually started chatting with them and found they were all calling for a Wendy Allen who either owed money, signed up for a subscription or opted-in to a specific sales list.
At first I figured Wendy Allen was the prior owner of my number and assumed the calls would diminish. A couple of sales agencies told me she had provided my number within the last seven days. At that moment I realized Wendy Allen was using MY phone number as her phony number!
Over five years later I still have the same phone number and I occasionally get calls for Wendy Allen. Instead of getting irritated or angry, however, I smirk and wittily engage the caller on the other end.
Sometimes we can maneuver around unwanted situations, carving out favorable results. Frequently, however, events will be outside of our control and the only thing we can manage is our reactions.
Don’t try to eliminate villains. Our Wendy Allens continue to show up in our lives until we master a particular life lesson.
Remember, the size of the hero is in direct proportion to the size of the villain. Once you become proficient at conquering smaller villains, larger ones appear. In embracing your monster villains you learn to master life.
P.S. And Wendy, if you’re reading this, I’d still appreciate it if you stopped giving out my phone number. Thanks!
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