A Call to Greatness
By Royane Real
Author of “Your Guide to Finding Friends, Making Friends and Keeping Friends ”
A few years ago, I was driving in my car when I spotted a friend of mine walking along the street. I stopped my car to have a little talk with him about how he was doing. My friend at the time was going through a tough period in his life. As we talked about what he was going through, he looked off into the distance and said to me, “You know, I can’t help thinking that somehow I’m being called to greatness”.
I was deeply moved by his comment, because I really did think that my friend had a huge capacity for being great, even though at the time his potential greatness might have been obscured by a lot of the challenges that life was giving him. At the same time I also felt slighted. I thought to myself, “Well, it’s nice that you’re being called to greatness, but what about me? I want to be called to greatness too! Why can’t I be great?”
I didn’t tell anybody my thoughts, because I didn’t want anyone to think that I was conceited. How could I actually tell anyone that I thought greatness might be a possibility for me? You’re not supposed to say stuff like that. So, I kept on acting like I was humble, not accomplishing much. Inside I was still troubled by these nagging thoughts that I was supposed to be doing great things, waiting for a sign.
A few months passed. I was having coffee with another long time friend of mine, a man who after many odd jobs is now a bus driver. He started talking to me about how resentful and surprised he is at how his life turned out. “How did I end up just being a bus driver? I always assumed I was supposed to be doing something great – I just don’t know what it is. It keeps nagging at me.”
My brother had a friend who had been a bank robber, and now is a small time con artist, thief and addict. Eventually this con artist thief stole thousands of dollars from my brother, but in the months before, while they were still friends, this man confessed to my brother that he had always felt like he was supposed to be doing something great in this world, and he didn’t know what it was. He didn’t know how he had fallen on to this other path.
When I discovered that even this con-artist-hoodlum-thief had a secret inner yearning to be great, it made me wonder.
I started to wonder if deep inside we all feel as if we are supposed to be doing something great, only we don’t talk to each other about it because it’s somehow embarrassing.
Maybe it’s true that we all come with an assignment into this world, trailing “clouds of glory” as William Blake put it in one of his poems.
The trouble is, it’s often so hard to know what our assignment is.
When are we being great? Is my friend great when he drives his bus? Should he really be doing something else?
Am I being great when I write my articles?
Am I being great when I go shopping?
Am I being great when I’m working in my lily garden?
Or are those the times when I’m running away from my greatness?
I don’t know the answers to those questions, and I don’t even know where to start to look for the answers to those questions.
All I know is that I was somehow supposed to be great.
And I suspect that maybe everyone else feels the same way.
By Royane Real
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