Author : Shane Parkins
When I was a child I held adventure near to my heart. As I lay in my bed I would doze off to heroic dreams; leading an army into battle, fighting off tigers and scaling a castle wall to rescue my princess. In the morning I would rise to rehearse my part with wooden swords and cardboard shields. The maiden was destined to be mine, and through my valor I would win her heart.I remember the moment I felt my heart drop to my stomach for the first time. I was in the first grade. Her name was Rachel. Traveling down the Australian coast from my Grandfathers, I laid in my cabin on the train and began to dream. Rachel was there with me, it felt so real she might have well been. With the innocence of a child, I held her. I felt her brush her soft blonde hair against me cheek. I still get chills when I recall the moment. I remember it so vividly; it was as if the world around had broken into symphony. I had won the beauty; I had scaled the wall and captured her heart. I know, it sounds really cheesy. But be honest with me for a moment. Whether you're a man or a woman, you know exactly what I'm talking about.Fairy tales, music, literature and movies all borrow from this mythic theme. A strong man coming to the rescue of a beautiful woman, it is written on our hearts and unveiled to us in the purity of our childhood. But somewhere between once upon a time and happily ever after, we got lost, we got wounded and we've become cynical.Don Henley says, We've been poisoned by these fairy tales.That seems like the most reasonable explanation in response to the futility of our quest for love. But what if its not true? What if we have not been poisoned by these fairy tales at all, but we have failed to take them seriously enough?Roland Hein says, Myths are stories that confront us with something transcendent and eternal.I'm almost 28 years a man now. I've had years of defeat, heartache, tragedy, failure and disillusionment. Yet I still dare to hope. And as I recall the stories which have brought me great courage along my quest for authentic masculinity, I realize there is something that I have overlooked. I can never reach the beauty without a fight; there is always a great battle between our longing and our destiny. Stay with me now. If this is true, than all the defeat, the heartache, the tragedy, the failure and the disillusionment doesn't have to be the final blow, it is not the end to the story, it is the middle. If this is true, it is what I was training for with my wooden stakes and cardboard scraps. If it truly is only the middle of the story, there is hope. Shrinking back is not an option, because on the other side of this battlefield is life, passion, victory; on the other side is love. It is this vision, I believe, which can provide the courage and strength to push through the pain of transformation.And what if there really is a dragon? What if it has just snuck up behind us in our dereliction of this thing we call life. What if it just looks different than what we expected?We have found that its fiery breath has come in the form of deep loss, failure, death, fear, rejection, sickness, abandonment and loneliness? The wounds are real and they have a way of burning their mark on our soul. But at some point we must decide. We must reconcile our wounds with the apparent incongruity between our longings and the way life has turned out. On that ground we are confronted with our identity and we must either choose to lie down in defeat, or to rise up to the moment we have known was coming all our lives.Some may be willing to rise up and fight once, twice, even three times. But a warrior knows his place in the battle. A warrior is in it for good. If we desire to have the love and passion and adventure that we dream about, that we ache for, we must abandon our self-protection and come to the place where it is no longer about winning or losing; it is about life and death. For what we attain too cheaply we esteem too lightly. But he that sheds his blood on the battle field, he shall enjoy the fruits of his labor, and his victory shall be heard on the playground in the voices of his children, and his children's children, for generations to come.I think I can do that. It is in me. It is what I have trained for. It is who I am.Shane Parkins is a social entrepreneur and serial innovator. He has developed his career as a Mortgage Planner around the concept of "venture philanthropy". With his passion for impacting the world around him, Shane Parkins has built partnerships with homeowners across the nation to fight the impact of poverty, one person at a time. A modern day abolitionist, Shane directs revenue created from home financing into groups that are on the front lines bringing freedom and healing to thousands around the globe. You can contact him at First National Mortgage Sources (916)369-6500 or email shaneparkins@gmail.com
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