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The Circus Elephant
Do you know what circus trainers do to keep a circus elephant from escaping? After every performance has been witnessed by the audience and once the show is officially over, the trainers clamp a metal chain onto a collar around the mighty elephant’s leg - where the chain is attached to a small, wooden peg that’s hammered into the ground. The 10-foot tall, 5,000 kg brute is more than capable in accomplishing the task of snapping the chain, uprooting the wooden peg without requiring any effort, and escape. However, that is not what happens. In fact, it does not even try. The world’s largest and most powerful land animal, which can uproot a tree as easily as you and I could break a toothpick, remains tied down by a small peg and a flimsy chain. How come? It’s because when the elephant was a baby, its trainers used exactly the same methods. A metal cuff was placed firmly around it’s leg, but the difference arises by having the wooden peg replaced with a sturdy metal stake hammered firmly in the ground. The chain and stake were strong enough for the baby elephant in order to prevent it from escaping. So, if it would try to break away, the metal chain would pull it back. In most cases, the elephant would pull harder resulting in the metal cuff to deeply wound the young calf’s leg by penetrating deep within its hide and cause it to bleed. Through many attempts and after suffering enough pain, the baby elephant finds no reason in continuing to break free from the shackles and stops trying all together.
Once the elephant is older, regardless of the fact that the same chain and wooden peg is used to tie it down, it remembers the pain that it felt as a baby and does not attempt in freeing itself. So, even though it’s just a chain and a little wooden peg, the elephant stands still. It remembers its limitations, and knows that it can only move as much as the chain will allow. It does not matter that the metal stake has been replaced by a wooden peg. It does not matter that the 100 kilo baby is now a 5,000 kilo powerhouse. However, the elephant’s belief prevails.
If you think about it, we are all like the circus elephant. We all have incredible strength and capabilities within ourselves. We have all of the necessary tools to achieve any goal that we choose to set for ourselves. However, we have our own chains and pegs of our own - our self-limiting beliefs that prevent us from moving forward. Sometimes it’s a childhood experience or an early failure. Sometimes it’s something we were told when we were younger. Time then to ask the question: “What’s holding you back?” What’s your chain and what’s your wooden peg?