At the same time as you have desires and deserve to have your desires fulfilled, you are not dependent upon your desires being fulfilled. Take note of this. Your desires do not have to be fulfilled. It’s A-OK to have desires unfulfilled. Certainly, you want your desires fulfilled, and you put your shoulder behind your desires. At the same time, everything in your life does not depend upon your desires being fulfilled. This is an idea you have had that has outlived its life span.

First of all, you don’t know when your desires will be fulfilled.

Secondly, you don’t know what may be the hidden desire within your desires. You have experienced how you wanted something with all your heart, and you got it and were disappointed. You have had the experience of a deep desire not being fulfilled no matter what. Later, with hindsight, you might see that fulfillment of a particular desire would not have brought you happiness.

And, yes, there are the unfilled desires that continue to fill your heart, and, if they could be fulfilled in the way you like, you are sure would only give you complete happiness. You could be right. On the other hand, no matter how much you might think so, the great happiness you have such faith in might not come along.

Again, I repeat with as clear a voice as I can, you do not need every great or little desire fulfilled in order for you to be happy.

The realization that even your most heartfelt desires worthy of merit do not have to be fulfilled takes some weight off your shoulders. That fact that some great desires of yours are not fulfilled, or not fulfilled on your timeline, does not mean you failed. If, for example, your business that you worked hard at and gave your everything to went under does not, absolutely does not mean that you failed. Look, you started the business and gave it your all. You have no right to draw the conclusion that you failed. Do not equate yourself with your business. You gave it a go. Anyone who never starts a business cannot be earmarked as having failed in it.

Consider this: You are you regardless of your business. No longer think of yourself as a success or failure because of seeming outcomes in life.

The fact is, whatever your experience, you inevitably grow from it.

Anyway, at the end of failure can lie success. You could lose your shirt on ten businesses and make it with shining colors on the eleventh. And you might have many more successes in the eyes of the world or none, yet this is not the basis upon which to set your value. Look not for your value outside you. All this outside is temporary anyway.

The value you hold is not in dispute. The outside world is not to determine your value, and, certainly, you are not to buy into anyone’s careless assessment, not even your own.

If you get an E in a test, you flunked the test. Do not wear a tee-shirt that says E on it. You are not to peg yourself in such a way. Simply do not peg yourself. Do not brand yourself as someone who gets an E. Once an E, not always an E. I suggest you wear a tee-shirt that says WG for Wonderful Guy or Wonderful Girl and don’t forget it.

And if you get an A, in a test, go ahead and do a little dance. It is a nice moment. May you have thousands of them, yet, at the end of the day, A’s and E’s fade away into the non-existent. Report cards get thrown away. World ratings don’t last, and they don’t matter. Don’t forget: There is a God Who loves you. I see further than any grading. Before Me, all stand equal. What I say counts more than any report card in the whole wide world.