The Gear

There was a little sad gear in the factory. He had once longed to be a bigger gear, to move important pieces of the machine and do his best to make the machine he inhabited function more efficiently.

But time passed, the work and training to become a bigger gear was strenuous, tiring. He was tired. More than tired, he soon began to doubt that he was important enough to dream such dreams, to work, to better himself. Surely there was a better gear out there than him for the position. Who was he to want to be something bigger?

And so one day he just grew up. He stopped doing his work, he stopped learning how to be a better gear. He just didn't see the point and didn't see in himself the capacity to be a grand and high gear.

But giving up didn't make him happy. Giving up on himself, precisely, caused his very soul to weep. But by then he didn't have the will to motivate himself. He lost the will, the motivation, the ambition. He didn't care if he ended working the trivial positions. He just didn't care.

And one day he passed for the factory. He saw his fellow gears grinding away. He saw they having as difficult, if not more difficult, time as he had. But they toiled away regardless. They worked, they slept less, they gave it their all. They didn't give up.

So what was so different between them and him? What did they have that he didn't? After all, he had striven and worked with them day after day. They had moments of despair, they had hard times. They weren't any better caliber of gear than he was. They were just like him, gears striving to be more than they are.

Maybe the only difference was the force of will? But the little gear looked and saw more than he thought he would. He realized that why were his difficulties and struggles any different than theirs? What gave him the right to give up on himself and to stop trying? His friends didn't. So why should he? Why was he so special to let his dreams fade and let circumstances overcome? He wasn't. He wasn't so special ti fail where others tread on.

And so the little gear began to take heart from that day, to not be selfish in his desires, and not let himself fail where others succeeded.