Empire Strikes Back is hands down the best movie in the Star Wars franchise. When Luke Skywalker travels to visit Yoda on Dagobah, he lands his X-Wing in the middle of a swamp. It eventually sinks to the bottom and Luke determines that they’ll never be able to get it out.
Yoda sighs and says, “Always with you, it cannot be done.” Luke says that moving around stones with the Force is one thing but raising his X-Wing from the swamp is totally different. Yoda says that it isn’t different – it is only different in Luke’s mind. He tells Luke that he must unlearn what he has learned and Luke replies half-heartedly, “Alright, I will give it a try.” Yoda raises his voice and says, “No! Try not! Do or do not. There is no try.”
Luke sets his mind to it and attempts to lift his X-Wing, but only manages to slightly raise it. It falls back into the swamp and sinks to the bottom. He tells Yoda he can’t raise it, it’s too big. Yoda gives him a pep talk about the Force and how it is his ally and Luke tells Yoda that he wants the impossible and walks away and sulks. Yoda then raises the X-Wing out of the swamp and moves it to dry land using the Force. Luke runs over and is amazed at what Yoda did. He proclaims, “I don’t believe it!” and Yoda replies, “That is why you fail.”
Now failure is part of the process and experience you gain when setting out to accomplish anything. However, for Yoda, he wants Luke to surrender to the Force. Why? Because a Jedi must trust the Force and believe in it. He must become one with the Force. Luke’s lack of belief is exactly why he fails.
When we don’t fully believe in ourselves and our abilities, we may not apply ourselves 100% because we don’t believe we will have a successful outcome. We may be impatient, like Luke was. Luke had only just begun his Jedi training…he still had so much to learn. Sometimes we tend to give up quickly because we aren’t seeing the results we want to see right away. Perhaps it is our own beliefs that get in the way of us learning how to become more.
Our initial beliefs about what we can and cannot do set the foundation for how we see ourselves and our abilities. When Yoda says, “Do or do not. There is no try”, he is imploring Luke to commit to the belief that he can do it. His biggest obstacle training Luke is Luke’s own beliefs about what is and is not possible.
Do you believe that what you want is possible? If you don’t, why don’t you believe it? What is standing in the way?
