Carl Jung, the great psychotherapist, said of Christopher Columbus, “By using subjective assumptions, a false hypothesis, and a route abandoned by modern navigation, he discovered America.”

Isn’t that marvelous?  We can take courage in that.  Columbus didn’t know what he was doing -- as is often the case with us.  All the smart people in Europe were saying that it was too risky.  You’ll kill yourself.  But what they didn’t know was that there was a whole new world just waiting for somebody to discover it.

All anybody had to do was just start sailing in that direction.  It didn’t really matter what assumptions they had.  It didn’t matter what hypothesis they were working from.  It didn’t matter what route they navigated.  It was out there.  All they had to do was to start sailing west.  Anybody who tried it would have found it.  It just took somebody with courage to go out and try to find a new world. [1]

You can translate that into your own situation.  There is a way out -- no matter what your situation is.  There is a new life to be found.  There is a new direction.  You must simply risk it, and act boldly in your willingness to risk.

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1. Mark Trotter, “The Danger of Sitting Still,” May 31, 1981.