Ever felt like a circus elephant? I have. Yesterday I heard this story that captures the experience perfectly:

"When [elephants are] young, they are attached by heavy chains to large stakes driven deep into the ground. They pull and yank and strain and struggle, but the chain is too strong, the stake too rooted. One day they give up, having learned that they cannot pull free, and from that day forward they can be "chained" with a slender rope. When this enormous animal feels any resistance, though it has the strength to pull the whole circus tent over, it stops trying. Because it believes it cannot, it cannot. "(Duen Hsi Yen)

In time, the chain becomes an illusion that is nonetheless every bit as powerful as the real thing. Shake off these imaginary chains, and you can change your life by breaking free of limitations imposed by ourselves or, more thank likely, others--usually in the form of harsh words. We don't have to believe the old way is the only way.

If we believe we can, we can.

Lao Tzu put it this way:

Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom; mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.