What is the cost of taking a risk?  Poet and philosopher Henry David Thoreau said, “The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.”

Is it worth it?  That’s up to you.

There will always be people who say that it’s not.  They’ll remind you that it’s better to go with what you know.  But I’ve always loved what war photographer Cecil Beaton said, “Be daring, be different, be impractical, be anything that will assert integrity of purpose and imaginative vision against the play-it-safers, the creatures of the commonplace, the slaves of the ordinary.”

To squash mediocrity and celebrate authenticity we have to put ourselves out there, show the world who we are, follow our hearts, take action and grow.

The founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg said, “The biggest risk is not taking any risk… In a world that’s changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.”

And author Neil Gaiman said, “The one thing that you have that nobody else has is you.  Your voice, your mind, your story, your vision.  So write and draw and build and play and dance and live as only you can.”

Not doing so is the biggest risk of all.