CHASING A DREAM

The Acres of Diamonds story ”a true one” is told of an African farmer who heard tales about other farmers who had made millions by discovering diamond mines. He was a poor man with responsibility’s. He owned an ox, a plow. He had a lot of land. He lived in a small house. But in many ways, he was blessed and he was content until he heard the tales.

In those days, they were discovering diamond mines. And you know how things get exaggerated. And he said, “What I should do, instead of working so hard and working myself silly with nothing to show for it…” even though he was content he focused on what he didn’t have instead of what he did have.

If you’re content you are blessed.

But the man, as he heard about people who were finding diamonds the size of rocks and becoming fabulously rich, became totally discontented with his life. He decided to sell his farm and he said, “I’m going to chase the diamonds. I’m going to find them”. And he hugged his wife, put his money in a sack, said goodbye to his children. And he said, “When I come back, we’ll be rich, and you’ll be set for life”. And he goes off looking for diamonds.

Nature cannot be tricked or cheated. She will give up to you the object of your struggles only after you have paid her price.

He spent the rest of his life wandering the African continent searching unsuccessfully for the gleaming gems that brought such high prices. Finally, worn out and despondent, he writes a note saying, “There’s no diamonds anywhere”. He jumped into a raging river and took his own life.

Meanwhile the man who bought the farm hooked up the same ox, the same plow, in the same field, the same small house he lived in, and he ate the same food. But one day, as he was plowing his fields, he kept noticing these black rocks that were extremely annoying to him and he was throwing them, every few feet, to the side of the field; stacking them up. Finally, he hits one so big he can’t hardly get around it. As the sun hits it, it has rainbow colors in it. And he thinks to himself, “That’s nice,” and placed it on the mantel.

Several weeks later a visitor picked up the stone, looked closely at it, and nearly fainted. He asked the farmer if he knew what he’d found. When the farmer said, no, that he thought it was a piece of crystal, the visitor told him he had found one of the largest diamonds ever discovered. The farmer had trouble believing that.

He said “I can’t plow a field without running into so many I have to stack ’em up”. He said, “You don’t understand. That is a diamond in the raw. That is a diamond right there”.

The farm the first farmer had sold, so that he might find a diamond mine, turned out to be one of the most productive diamond mines on the entire African continent. The first farmer had owned, acres of diamonds. But he had sold them for practically nothing, in order to look for them elsewhere.

If the first farmer had only taken the time patience brings, prepared himself to learn what diamonds looked like in their rough state, and to thoroughly explore his property before looking elsewhere, all of dreams would have been realised.

Every dream has a process and a price tag. Those who embrace the process and pay the price, live the dream. Those who don’t, just dream.

You don’t need to look elsewhere for opportunity, achievement or success. All of the opportunities you could possibly want can be found where you are now. To achieve the best results, we need to dig in, be patient and be willing to pay the price.

You may have heard the expression, “The grass is always greener on the other side.”

 

We all dream of making it within the entertainment industry. Before you chase after what you think are greener pastures, make sure that your own is not just as green or perhaps greener. It has been said that if the other guy’s pasture appears to be greener than ours, it’s quite possible that it’s getting better care. Also, while you’re looking at other pastures, other people are looking at yours.

 

Basil Reynolds

Coaching Consultant

Finding the Music Inside