UNREALISED AMBITIONS.

Waikato Times, Volume 100, Issue 16781, 26 April 1926, Page 2

UNREALISED AMBITIONS.

A SPUR AND A TONIC. Life soon teaches us that the zest goes out of the light when the goal is attained. And yet we weep over our unrealised ambitions! We seem unable to cultivate the mental habit of regarding them as a spur and a tonic, rather than as a source of tears. There are moments.when no power on earth could persuade us that we shouldbo very unhappy folks if we had nothing left to dream of. Wo want the uream realised at the touch of some magic wand. But if it were, how tame and tasteless this world would be. Nature has implanted in us all—men and women alike —the lighting instinct. Women fight for themselves and for their children as valiantly as ever warrior fought in battle. They may mourn their defeats, but in their brave hours they know that the tang would go out of the victory if they never knew a setback or rebuff.. The harder the obstacle the more thrilling the contest—if we arc made of the right stuff. Haven't they proved it over and over again, those pioneer women to whom we owe so much, and to whom the succeeding generations will owe more? Haven't we, too, in our lesser spheres, proved over and over again that when the enemy seemed nearest the gates, the relief forces have been close at hand? It is our spur and our tonic, that trumpet call that sounds clearly, if faintly, in the very hour of impending defeat. There arc always obstacles between ourselves and our highest ambitions; and the whole savour of life is in surmounting these obstacles and then engaging in the next light! Look about vou at the discontented women you know. Why are theysborcd with life? Jii nine cases out of ten it is because someone else has done their fighting for them. Never having known a set-back', they know nothing of the thrill of victory. Do not envy them the luxuries that another lias showered upon them. Because they have never entered life's battlefields, they suffer from a sense of pei-petual defeat.