Only a Concept

I mentioned potential in my last post.

I've been thinking about that a lot lately.  All of the times that people have made excuses for others who were either toxic for them, or they grasped at in desperation, claiming they had potential.  Situations that people just let go by, saying it had the potential to turn into something great.

And I've realized, potential is an excuse.  It's an excuse to sit back and not go and do.

Everyone has potential.  Everything has potential.  It doesn't matter what is happening, but every person can strive to grow and do better, or learn from something bad that occurs.

I feel like we use the concept of potential to justify feeling attached to things.  When someone makes poor decisions, and fucks up, we say that it's a shame they did it, because they had such potential. 

Well, of course they did, but we act within our own habits, and sometimes, potential is fake.  Sometimes, potential is just our own hope for something outside of our own power.

Let us not act on the concept of potential, but simply act.  Think about what we want, both from people and situations, and actively work to create it.

Potential is something that sets us up for disappointment.