Why Taking Risks Is So Important

Successful risk-taking always involves rethinking the impossible. The four-minute mile was impossible until Roger Bannister broke it; now it’s commonplace. Take risks, learn from your mistakes, and you’ll have a much higher chance of succeeding at anything you want to accomplish. The bigger risks you are willing to take, the faster you will succeed — or fail. Taking fewer risks just slows everything way, way down. You could still become wildly successful, but it may take several years to get there. You could also end up failing eventually, but that too will be drawn out over a longer period of time.

As Steve Harvey says in this short motivational video, You HAVE to JUMP!

Don't think for a second that Neil and Buzz weren’t freaking out before they got into an eight-ton firecracker that was going to take three days to get to the moon. They didn’t even know if they’d sink elbow deep in moon dust, but they took one small step for man, and an even greater leap for mankind. Every person in history who has EVER achieved their dreams are people who were not afraid to take risks. And we will never know what we could have accomplished if we never put ourselves to the test.

I offer you a few inspirational quotes on risk-taking; read them carefully and take heed! JUMP TODAY!

The fear of death is the most unjustified of all fears, for there’s no risk of accident for someone who’s dead. – Albert Einstein

Unless you choose to do great things with it, it makes no difference how much you are rewarded, or how much power you have. – Oprah Winfrey

No man is worth his salt who is not ready at all times to risk his well-being, to risk his body, to risk his life in a great cause. – Theodore Roosevelt

Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go. – T. S. Eliot

If you are not willing to risk the unusual, you will have to settle for the ordinary. – Jim Rohn

Once we believe in ourselves we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit. – e. e. cummings

The only way to find true happiness is to risk being completely cut open. – Chuck Palahniuk

It seems to be a law of nature, inflexible and inexorable, that those who will not risk cannot win. – John Paul Jones

You can measure opportunity with the same yardstick that measures the risk involved. They go together. – Earl Nightingale

Life is inherently risky. There is only one big risk you should avoid at all costs, and that is the risk of doing nothing. – Denis Waitley

It is better to risk starving to death then surrender. If you give up on your dreams, what’s left? – Jim Carrey

Decision is a risk rooted in the courage of being free. – Paul Tillich

I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood. – Audre Lorde

The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision. – Maimonides

It is better by noble boldness to run the risk of being subject to half the evils we anticipate than to remain in cowardly listlessness for fear of what might happen. – Herodotus

If we listened to our intellect, we’d never have a love affair. We’d never have a friendship. We’d never go into business because we’d be too cynical. Well, that’s nonsense. You’ve got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down. – Annie Dillard

There’s something liberating about not pretending. Dare to embarrass yourself. Risk. – Drew Barrymore

You don’t concentrate on risks. You concentrate on results. No risk is too great to prevent the necessary job from getting done. – Chuck Yeager

Every man has the right to risk his own life in order to preserve it. Has it ever been said that a man who throws himself out the window to escape from a fire is guilty of suicide? – Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Creative people who can’t help but explore other mental territories are at greater risk, just as someone who climbs a mountain is more at risk than someone who just walks along a village lane. – R. D. Laing

Anyone who takes himself too seriously always runs the risk of looking ridiculous; anyone who can consistently laugh at himself does not. – Vaclav Havel

Often the difference between a successful man and a failure is not one’s better abilities or ideas, but the courage that one has to bet on his ideaa, to take a calculated risk, and to act. – Maxwell Maltz

There can be no vulnerability without risk. There can be no community without vulnerability. There can be no peace, and ultimately no life, without community. – M. Scott Peck

In battle it is the cowards who run the most risk; bravery is a rampart of defense. – Sallust

Accept that all of us can be hurt, that all of us can and surely will at times fail. Other vulnerabilities, like being embarrassed or risking love, can be terrifying, too. I think we should follow a simple rule: if we can take the worst, take the risk. – Joyce Brothers

To win without risk is to triumph without glory. – Pierre Corneille

You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition.You can’t get there by bus, only by hard work and risk and by not quite knowing what you’re doing. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover will be yourself. – Alan Alda

Our lives improve only when we take chances, and the first and most difficult risk we can take is to be honest with ourselves. – Walter Anderson

Creative risk-taking is essential to success in any goal where the stakes are high. Thoughtless risks are destructive, of course, but perhaps even more wasteful is thoughtless caution which prompts inaction and promotes failure to seize opportunity. – Gary Ryan Blair

What I tell these young people is, the world is not as dangerous as the older generation would like you to believe. Anyone I know who has ever taken a risk and lost a job has ended up getting a better one two years later. – Jonathan Kozol

The refusal to rest content—the willingness to risk excess on behalf of one’s obsessions—is what distinguishes artists from entertainers and what makes some artists adventurers on behalf of us all. – John Updike

The principle element in a performance is risk, and if you’re losing interest then by scaring yourself to death the audience will feel it and boy it’ll wake them up. – Leo Kottke

Because if you’re prepared and you know what it takes, it’s not a risk. You just have to figure out how to get there. There is always a way to get there. – Mark Cuban