Play On!

“There are lots of ways to become a failure, but never taking a chance is the most successful.”

—Anonymous

Taking no risk at all is a risky business. A defensive life is comparable to driving one’s car in reverse during all ones Earthly days.

We look for riskless situations in life, in love and in the material world.

We make deals with “risk potential” in securities we buy, automobiles we drive and people we marry. Is there any way to remove all risk?

Is there any totally riskless way to save money?

Put it under the mattress? Come on! Mattresses provide security only insofar as they are secret, fireproof and oblivious to a building’s collapse. The 100 cents in a dollar may be worth only 70 cents after five years under your mattress.

We lose the buying power of money when we let it just sit. Money must work, or its value diminishes.

When you are asleep in bed, your personal risk may seem infinitesimal. When you get up into a world rife with the potential of hurting or even killing you, you are glad that you have life insurance!

If a pitcher has developed a world-class right arm, he can’t save it for his future by putting it in a sling. He must keep on pitching, and the act of pitching carries the inherent risk of strain and injury that can slow down or even end his career at any time. Highly paid athletes risk their bodies to earn a rich living — and usually their high-earning span is a short one.

When I was in high school, I played on the football team. We wore no facemasks and our helmets were leather. Had I known that I, within a few years, would become an opera singer, I most surely would never have played football. I consider it a wonder that I did not have a broken nose or my front teeth kicked out. The risk-reward ratio can, we learn, change radically within a few short years of one’s life.

Risks in automobiles are enormous. Driving your car may be the riskiest thing you ever do in your whole life. You must be careful of what you are doing and what that guy in the car coming toward you is doing. He may be on drugs, alcohol or both and may be driving in a rage against his boss, his wife or others.

The physical fact that objects in motion tend to stay in motion should be on your mind a lot. After all, it’s sudden stops, and not simply movement, that most often kill people.

The risky decision to remain idle must be considered very carefully and maturely.

Rashness in thinking, in speaking and in acting, without time for judicious consideration, can get you into risky investments, risky handshakes and risky marriages.

You’ve got plenty of time to consider carefully the next election.

Don’t vote hastily and risk voting against your — and future generations’ — best interests!