a cause for change

Consider the following situation: friend A who is strong-willed and a pleasant company to be around with but is incurably dishonest and friend B who is resourceful and talented but tends to be careful to the extent of extreme hesitation.

Friend A is not ashamed to flagrantly distort and exaggerate the facts of his life and his accomplishments; friend B has grown too comfortable with his life and the sense of security it has accorded to him to the point that any possibilities for personal betterment seemed reprehensible to him.

In short, one of them have an excessive desire to become more that what he really is and the other is afraid to become more than what he possibly could and capable of; here's a toast to stability!

Friend A argued that it is unhealthy for others to doubt his achievements because he believed that - as he put it himself - "everyone has the innate ability to realise his potential to its fullest given that he worked hard enough."

The statement is perfectly agreeable to most people; but if taken at face value, it seemed to justify his somewhat gradiose claims and stories, leaving no room for scrutinization; he can go about distorting and exaggerating facts without any qualms because others do not have any right to question them or if based on his logic, anything is possible if one works hard enough.

People often say that if you work hard enough, you can reach for the stars; but I doubt that they meant it to be taken literally.

If the claims and stories start to contradict each other, bordering on spatial and temporal impossibility, no amount of 'hard work' or 'effort' can make them agree with each other; mere mortals are not able to turn water into wine.

As tempting as it might be for me to 'publicly' expose the inconsistencies in his claims and stories with the distant hope that it will eventually bring him back to the ground, I have decided to bring the matter up to him and allow him to set his records straight.

I must admit that this involves a huge leap of faith for me as he have never gave me a strong and consistent reason to completely trust him. Even though believing in someone is far less wearying than doubting them, it should not be done at the expense of the truth.

As for friend B, I felt that he has grown a little too complacent with his current position; one will be hard pressed to find any fault about this, but he himself is not too happy with it either - he often complains about the dull monotony of his life and how dissatisfied he is with it.

I think when you are continually dissatisfied about something which you are supposed to be extremely fond of, then something is wrong somewhere and it would be wise for you to stop for while and re-examine your motives.

Besides, what do you do when you found out that the wine doesn't taste as good as you expect it would?

However, most people have a certain amount of emotional inertia which makes them intrinsicly resistant to change or even the mere thought of change; being cooped up for a long time in a single place does not serve to remove the comfortable sense of security and control which firmly withhelds one from embracing change and improvement.

Indeed, a person have to muster a great deal of courage and preseverance to abandon one's lofty and well-to-do position for better and greener pastures. It might be a rough and abscure path but you will never fully comprehed its worth until one has travelled it for yourself.

I think the lack of change which will eventually lead to stagnation and deterioration should be a good enough reason to nudge oneself to start one's journey down that path; everyone have the capacity to better themselves and it is a tremendous waste to let that opportunity slip away.

However, the zeal to better and improve oneself should always be grounded in reality and not allowed take operatic proportions and grandeur; to do so would cause one's true intentions to be unduly questioned - even by well-meaning individuals.