They built the pyramids like this.  With small steps; the dust and discarded doubt beneath their fingertips.  Their hands dirty in ways that only a triumphant ending would be able to wash off.  Their backs bruised from bearing a weight most of us will never know.  The burden of building an ideal unbroken by time, knowing that while it may blemish, its impression on the world will never erode.

While somewhere in suburbia, we built a house of cards, like this:  With small steps; the blindfolds and discarded ambition around us.  Our hands manicured, and softened in the way palms not adept at molding daydreams into action often are.  Our creditors, like wolves at the door.  The ones who threaten to huff, puff, and blow the whole damned deck down around us.  The ones who we will inevitably force-feed ourselves, and later–our children, to.  After we realize too late that though we can perpetually buy ourselves into bigger homes, we will never be able to afford the time to enjoy it all.

We are desperate in different ways.  Desperate for answers.  Desperate for recognition.  Desperate to claw ourselves to the top.  Needing to believe that we are headed somewhere…anywhere but backwards.  The vain among us think we are who the world sees us as.  The foolhardy think they have it all figured out.  While the numb live listlessly in a proverbial bathrobe and slippers; indifferent to the direction our great carousel spins.  Agnostic about where it will all stop.

If you’ve ever clutched your stomach and tried to hold your insides-in as you beg for a breather, then you know a little about what the fear of failure feels like.  The cold darkness that comes from seeing the world surge past you as your life careens off the guard-rails.  The end credits in the darkened theater; and the last audience member whose back passes through the exit before your name appears on the screen.  The slurred apologies you’ve offered yourself in the dark.  The disappointment you never want to see at home in the eyes of your loved ones.  The gradual fading to black of a future you’ve been afraid to admit you’ve always wanted.

The ascension occurs a step at a time.  Each foot forward feels less stubborn than the last.  We become weighted in different ways.  Tethered to things that matter, instead of being anchored to the motionless wreck so many of us begrudgingly refer to as a career.  The people we admire the most, the ones who burn as vibrantly in retrospect as they did when they were alive…they learned to become weightless.  They lived without ever touching the ground.

The road isn’t effortless for anyone.  Nor would any paths other than those which we have been set upon be less arduous.  The devil may be in the details, but salvation lies in embracing the individual beauty of every jigsaw in the puzzle.

Our Legends were just men once.  Like you, they felt their backs against the wall and saw the fangs closing-in on their throats.  Like you, they decided, one day, that they’d had enough.  And like you, they decided to become something better than anyone ever thought they could.  There is something you’ve always wanted to build.  There is a person you’ve always wanted to be.  No one will give it to you.  You will have to fight for it.  With both fists at the ready.  Life is short, and grows shorter still.  Ante Up, my friend.

Credits: Photography – the Mighty 12Rnd + Jacket – Phineas Cole + Pants & Tie – Panta Clothing + Square - Drakes of London.

Soundtrack: Justice “Audio, Video, Disco”