Taking that leap

This morning I met up with a friend I made in difficult, searching times. I so admire her, she is intelligent, strong, tenacious, beautiful, courageous. She did what so many dream of doing but never find the will or the strength to: she left her high-paying, status, corporate job to start a  small restaurant. She loves to cook, you see, so she looked life in the face and leaped.

Oh, she planned and budgeted. She did her numbers. She knew how many cups of coffee she would need to sell, how many meals, and just how many pieces of cutlery she could expect to lose, to make a profit. Yup, there's an industry standard, a benchmark, for cutlery loss (and here I was thinking that teaspoons have a secret hiding place alongside the one for kitchen scissors and paring knives). Anyway, she jumped with a plan, to howls of derision and shaking heads. "All those degrees, and you're baking cakes?"

She won't tell you it's been a walk in the cream puff park. There have been really tough times when things have gone miserably wrong and people have let her down so badly she wept. She has been emotionally and physically drained with the changes to her life but she has not given up. She has continued to pursue her dream which is becoming her reality.

I look at her and think about all those gurus who pontificate about finding your purpose, doing what you love and life will be magnificent. They make it all sound so easy. What they fail to tell us is that to take that leap needs courage, it needs a plan, it needs energy and determination. And things can and probably will go wrong. You need a support system and some cheerleaders.

I am one of her cheerleaders. I shake my pom poms and do cartwheels in the air. I want her to succeed, I want her to win. If she wins we all win. And I know that one day when I need a cheerleader she will be there for me. When I take that leap of faith.

What about you?