“Never tell me the odds”, says Han Solo as he prepares to try, against all odds, to successfully navigate an asteroid field.

     “Why the hell not?” you ask.  Or at least, some people do.

     I think the answer is obvious, but what the heck, I’ll say it anyway…

     …because it doesn’t matter.

     The asteroid field must be navigated.  There IS no other option.  The odds, no matter how carefully compiled the data, no matter how accurately calculated to whatever degree of precision, do not matter.

     Han Solo is committed to navigating the field, and he must give every fiber of his being to do it, and he can’t have one iota of doubt, or they will all be turned into trace carbon readings on the ragged remains of the Millennium Falcon’s hull.  In his mind, endocrine system, and neuro-chemistry, Han Solo must create a reality where success is the ONLY outcome, and here C3PO is chattering away about consensual reality and hosing everything up.

     I would love to quote a friendly acquaintance of mine, Chris Jones.  If you are into comic books, you may have seen his work.  He’s very talented, and a genuinely swell guy.

     Anyway, I was at one of his panels at Convergence this year…”Drawing with Chris Jones”.  I went, I drew some funny faces (not very well), and I listened to Chris and watched him draw.  It’s fascinating.  I love watching talented people draw.  I can wait for any length of time to see a picture emerge from the motion of the pencil over the paper.  It seems like magic to me because I don’t understand how it works at all...which is OK, because it just makes me happy that there are people who DO understand it.

     But as I was saying before I went off topic, I would love to quote him, but I don’t remember exactly what he said, so I will have to settle for paraphrasing him instead.

     It was something along the lines of:  I would never recommend that anyone go into comics to make a living.  There’s almost no chance that you will succeed, and even if you do, you will barely make anything resembling a living at it.  The only reason to go into comics is because you have no other choice.  You have to love it.  You have to not be able to live without doing the work.

     Ask just about any writer, artist, actor, athlete and they will tell you the same thing.

     So why I am I telling you this?  Because I have learned something else about impossible odds over the years: they don’t get any more possible if you listen to the Nay-Sayers and give up.

     And if you are one of the people who cannot live without doing the work, and you give up the work…you, my friend, are headed for a special kind of hell that’s right here on this earth.  More specifically, it’s between your own ears, and you can never get away from it as long as you deny the need to do the work.  Trust me, I know of what I speak.

     For some reason, anytime you get an idea, every time you get a dream in your head that you can’t shake loose…there will be someone who will tell you that you can’t do it.  They will list all of the people they know of who are smarter, stronger, faster, and more talented than you who crashed and burned and lived pathetic, mangled lives due to their failure.

     They will have statistics about how many small businesses fail.  They will tell you about their cousin Edna who blew all of her inheritance thinking she could be a writer and now just sits around in a house full of cats talking to herself.  They will point out to you that all you need is one good knee injury and your career as a sports hero is over.

     Sometimes they are well-meaning people who just don’t understand that kind of passion, and think that if they smack you down before it really takes off, they will save you from heart-break.  Sometimes they are people who feel the pull themselves, and never had the guts to take the risk, and some of them are jealous, talentless and malicious dream killers who should never have been allowed within 100 miles of impressionable young minds (why yes, I AM referring to a few specific people…how perceptive of you to notice).

     So what I’m trying to say here, in my rather sarcastic, bombastic, and flippant way is: yes, the odds may be against you, and you may crash and burn…but you have to ask yourself…does that matter to you?

     Are you one of the people for whom there is no other choice?  If you are, you need to accept that the odds may apply to you…but beyond that they can be given no more consideration.  They are meaningless, and to continue to give them any concession of significance is a dangerous waste.  Once you realize this, it is rather freeing.  Once you get used to it, it is rather fun.  The odds don’t apply to you anymore.  You can do whatever you want.  If you crash and burn, it’s no more or less than what you expected anyway, and it beats the hell out of torturing yourself with might-have-beens.

     Take some time and search your soul.  Do you have a dream that you abandoned a long time ago because someone told you it was all but impossible?  Do you feel regret, anger, bitterness, and disappointment when you think about it?  When you see someone pursuing their dreams, do you want to warn them off of it?  Caution them against wasting their time?  Do you resent their arrogance and want to smack them down? 

     Instead of that, maybe the best thing to do would be to look to yourself and your own unfinished personal tasks.  Adopt your best side-ways space-pirate grin, and growl “never tell me the odds.”

     Give it a try.  Don’t waste any more time, and for God’s sake, keep the odds to yourself.  I’m working here.