The Viable Alternative

I was inspired to write this poem a couple of weeks ago and put in on social media:

You stood at the edge of the cliff
You held your breath and closed your eyes
And boldly took the leap of Faith
Spread your wings and flew
But the skies are turbulent
The flight is unsteady
The air too brisk
The speed more than you can handle
You wonder if you took the right step
But regardless of your fear
Despite the uncertainty
You’re exactly where you need to be
And things are going the way they need to go
– Ike Love

Truth be told, the main person this poem was meant for was ME. I shared it with others thinking they may need its message as well.

As of recent, I decided to take the leap of Faith by going forward in pursuing different projects on my heart despite not having the money.

There’s been one particular project on my heart called THE IKE SHOW VIDEO LAUNCH – “Get out of Your Own Way,” an event that I’ve wanted to put on meant to promote myself as a model and inspirer which is meant to transport people to a world that shows you what life is like when you “get out of your own way.”

The project is broken up into several components that have to be completed in order for me to be able to have an actual event. The first component was completed several years back, however, after that, my project hit a brick wall because I started having financial problems. My goal was to work on overcoming these financial obstacles so that I can then fund the next phase of my project.

Unfortunately, that never happened, and years started to pass by as the project sat on the shelf collecting dust, with me being disillusioned, resentful, angry and sometime depressed about the whole thing.

Because things weren’t improving financially for me, the next option was to ask close friends for money to help fund the project, however, I was too proud to do that. While I wasn’t opposed to asking people for help, I didn’t want to do it at this juncture.

Well, thanks to time passing by without my financial situation getting better and mental shifts and breakthroughs I experienced as a result of therapy, I decided this year that maybe it was time for me to bite the bullet, swallow my pride, and ask those close to me for help.

As I started getting money from well meaning friends, I decided to set a date to execute this phase of the project even though I didn’t know where the rest of the money was going to come from. I just figured that I set a date and make sure the money was there by hook or by crook by the day of the date. I also put a team together for the project which involved a makeup artist, videographer, still photographer and the actual photographer that was going to shoot me. Interestingly, when I did all this, things started to come through for me on my own end so that I was able to use my own money to fund the project.

So as not to keep you in the dark, the project was a photoshoot for an underwear designer that was to produce life sized shots of me for an ad campaign that was to be displayed at my upcoming event. The videographer and still photographer were hired to shoot the behind the scenes shots that were going to be put together for a video that will be displayed at the event to give the guests a view of what went into the making of the show.

Anyway, thankfully, I was able to complete the project successfully, which gave me this incredible boost of self-confidence, a huge sense of accomplishment, and the momentum to want to do even more.

Despite my success, more challenges were on the horizon. The videographer still needed to edit the video footage, and he of course wasn’t doing it for free. Since the guy was leaving the country in October for two months for a project he was hired to film, I thought to myself that this meant I had plenty of time to raise the money to edit the video when he got back, so I decided to sit on the footage and wait until then. However, a mentor of mine STRICTLY warned me not to wait until he got back and to go ahead and get the editing done BEFORE he left the country, because I didn’t know what would happen when he left the country. He said he may wind up being hired to stay longer, thus delaying my project further or even maybe causing me to start this part of the project from scratch if something happened to him or the footage.

I told him I didn’t have the money to pay for the editing, and he told me to have FAITH and move forward.

GULP!

Well, luckily for me, I was able to talk him down in price for the editing. We also agreed that I’d pay him half to get the project started and the other half when he completed the project.

As “circumstance” had it, I have a side gig that I use to help pay my rent that pays me every other Wednesday, or usually twice a month. This particular month of September allowed me to get paid three times, so I was able to take the extra money and pay my deposit to start the editing. I didn’t know where I was going to get the rest of the money. I figured that I work with him to finish the job to my satisfaction, and let him hold onto the video until I was able to get the rest of money to pay for the editing job, and then he can send the final video to me from wherever in the world he was at.

That was my plan, but again, Providence smiled on me once more and I was finally able to break a dry streak in real estate and use the money from that to pay for the other half of the editing job.

Be that as it may, just when I thought I was about to “coast” in the air, more challenges loom.

I was told by a mentor that since I haven’t put on an event for a number of years to promote myself as a model due to the “hiatus” I took dealing with life’s issues, I needed to put on another event before the end of the year to get my name back out in the real world outside social media BEFORE I put on the main show I’ve been working on, THE IKE SHOW VIDEO LAUNCH.

I of course protested, because this meant spending more money that I wasn’t certain from where it was going to come. On top of this, I still owe money to eye doctors, accountants, plus I have bills and rent to pay.

He again told me to keep on going and just have faith.

It is often said, “Be careful what you wish for…” I’ve heard tons of inspiring stories of successful and highly impactful people about how it was the faith they had that enabled them to achieve what they’ve been able to achieve, and always wished I could have that kind of Faith so I can achieve my own greatness. Well, within the last couple of weeks, challenged with being out of my comfort zone, I’ve felt overwhelmed, bewildered, scared and uncertain as to where things were going, how things were going to turn out, and how I was going to be able to handle everything. As a reaction, I wanted to run and hide somewhere and put a halt to everything so that everything would once more feel “manageable.” I’ve just had this feeling that I’m flying by the seat of my pants with no control as to where or how things were going.

As I reflected about this, I realized that though often glamourized as some mystical feat, this was exactly what it was like to have Faith: feeling the uncertainty of being out of your comfort zone, walking in the dark not being able to see too far ahead of you, knowing where you eventually wanted to wind up but not really knowing where you’re going, feeling way in over year head and that you bit off way more than you can chew, and toying with the idea of turning back.

Faith, though beautiful, isn’t always pretty. It’s inspiring to watch it in others but scary to take upon it ourselves, that’s why most people choose to stay in their comfort zones. I realized that every great person past and present had to deal with the same feelings at one time or another until they developed their “Faith muscle,” and got comfortable feeling uncomfortable.

I realized, that as someone who wanted to be great, create an amazing life and not die with any regrets, and also as someone who saw the years passing by and wanted to make moves in his own life, I was EXACTLY in the right place.

This is The Viable Alternative.

Hope this helps,

Ike Love