Lessons From Ricky Ross

I've started reading the blog of former drug lord, Ricky Ross. It's interesting to say the least; he's committed his remaining time in prison and his efforts toward education, both for himself and educating others through his blog. Most of his posts deal with urban culture, racial reconciliation, and the dangerous realities of the drug industry (needless to say, they're usually not entirely relevant for a suburban white college student.) Although, in his most recent post, I can say that I learned a genuine lesson. In his post, he discussed BHAG, or "Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals".

"Too often we don't think much of ourselves. We have a tendency to think other people are better than us or born with special ability. And when you think like this, you have a tendency to say, "what the heck," but watch out. We must have a certain level of unreasonable confidence. A confidence to say I can go with what others say they can't."

I think the Church, and society as a whole, has lost sight of what healthy confidence is. There's either a denigrating and restricting sort of humility that views others as having unrealistic capability, or plain arrogance that places that views the self as having special inherent capabilities that no one else has. What would it look like to level the playing field? To set ridiculous goals for ourselves, and know that we can achieve things we doubt? To know that even the successful had to start from the same point that we start from?

I learned a lesson from a drug lord... awesome.