THE "One"

1 in 4 women have experienced domestic violence in her lifetime. 

1 in 100 people have schizophrenia. 

1 in 1000 people have tourettes.

1 in a million people die from flu vaccinations each year.

____________________________________________________________

Although these numbers may not be 100% correct, we hear these "chances" ALL the time. 1 in this and 1 in that. Let's just say there are 100,000,000 people in the U.S. (to keep it simple), that means if the chances are 1 in a million, there are 100 people in the U.S. that will fall into that category. So why is it that people still act like it won't or can't happen to them? 

I have always been confused as to why people take the chances they take knowing the risks and using the fact that it is "rare" as an excuse. Unless I am told "this has never happened to anyone on this earth EVER", I will never say "it won't happen to me".

I don't only want to limit this to negative events, chances of a writer becoming a famous author, a singer becoming an international icon, as well as other things, if you look at the number of people who TRY and actually succeed is rare as well. However, we still let the "chances" hold us back and often discourage others from working toward their dreams.

Although some negative events are not things you can avoid, there are a lot of other things out there that have these same odds and are things we CAN avoid. 

It is amazing how we ignore the odds of bad things happening and do it anyway continuously, but pay such CLOSE attention to the odds of positive things and stray away or discourage others from going for it. We are indeed a backwards race and the world would be SO much better if the opposite were true. We like to learn from our OWN mistakes and live vicariously through OTHERS successes. Yes, sometimes it is best to learn on your own, but for me, some things are not worth it and I am glad to learn from the mistakes of others.

What lessons have you learned on your own that you could have avoided if you learned through someone else's mistakes?

What successes are you bypassing by not striving to be the ONE?