Dear
Bloggers,
I
have to make a lot of decisions at the moment and find hardly any
time to follow my dreams. And I think it’s a lot less about “What
if”
and more about “Why
don’t I know what my dream is?”
and probably more importantly “Where
can I find my dream?“.
If
you don’t have a dream and don’t care about not having a dream –
well then you probably aren’t reading this anyway. If
you don’t have a dream and you do wish you had one. Then I believe
that wish for a dream
is
actually a sign that you do have a dream…
it’s just buried under some other stuff right now.
I’m
going to share some possible scenarios of what could be happening
here and some ideas for what to do with them:
Scenario
1:
You know what your dream is, but you are scared to admit it to
yourself or to others. This
is completely understandable! Having a dream is scary. Having a dream
and going after it means everything
in tour life could change.
Having a dream and going after it means taking big risks. By not
admitting that you have a dream, you can avoid all of this change and
risk and uncomfortable stuff.
And
yet...well, it’s still uncomfortable, isn’t it?
In
avoiding change and risk you also avoid the joy of the dream come
true. Mostly
you avoid doing the thing you really want to be doing.
Your
dream isn’t a superficial thing. It’s important. It comes from
your heart and your soul. It’s tied to your purpose for being here
on this planet. Avoid
the dream and it will not go away. It will only grow more and more
difficult to avoid. But
all that stuff you are avoiding? It’s real too. And it’s scary.
Pretending it’s not there is not a good plan.
What
may work here: Admitting
it very quietly by writing it in your diary or your agenda. Start to
give the dream just a little bit of space. You don’t have to tell
anyone else about it and you certainly don’t have to do
anything about it. Just give it some space to be and see what comes
of that. Baby steps.
Scenario
2: You know what your dream is, but don’t believe that you can
have it, so it’s kind of uncomfortable to think about it.
Awww.
First
I just want to give you a hug. Everything
I said above about your dream is true: Your dream isn’t a
superficial thing. It’s important. It comes from your heart and
your soul. It’s tied to your purpose for being here on this planet.
And
also: Avoid
the dream and it will not go away. It will only grow more and more
difficult to avoid.
That
last part is even more true in this case. Your dream is really
important and it is asking you to work through your fear that you
don’t deserve it or can’t have it for some reason. It is asking
you to believe. What
may work here: Asking
“What if?” What if it was OK for me to pursue this dream? What If
if was OK for me to have this dream? What do I think I deserve? What
would have to happen in order for me to believe I deserve more?
Forcing
yourself to go after your dream won’t be helpful here, working on
changing your mind about what is possible for you will be helpful.
Taking some slow baby steps towards your dreams may be helpful too.
Sometimes that “I don’t think I can have it” starts to fade
when it sees evidence that you really can have it.
Scenario
3: There is so much that you want to do, that you can’t pick
just one to identify as “your dream”. Well this is actually a
fantastic situation to be in, even though it doesn’t always feel
like it. I really believe it’s better to have too many ideas than
too few. I always have way more ideas and dreams than I can possibly
work on.
Sometimes
this “I
have so many things I want to do I can’t commit to one thing”
is just a way of sabotaging yourself, usually due to one of the fears
mentioned above, so you may want to check those out and see if any of
the ideas there feel like they may be helpful to you. If
that’s not it, then what is happening here is a bottleneck. Too
many ideas, too little time/resources and nothing can get through.
You relieve the bottleneck by choosing some dreams to work on now and
putting the other dreams aside for now. If
the thought of putting some dreams aside makes you freak out a
little:
look
at what is really happening here.
If
you focus on one or two dreams for now, and actually bring them to
life, then it becomes much easier to go back to those other dreams
and bring them to life as well. With each dream come true you become
more experienced at bringing dreams to life and you open up new
possibilities for how to bring your dreams to life.
But
still, choosing can be hard. What
may work here: Asking
yourself Which
dreams am I most passionate about?
This might help to narrow it down. If you start to work on the dream
that you are most passionate about, all that passion can help to make
it happen faster, so you can get back to the other dreams.
Or
you can ask yourself Which
dreams feel the easiest to work on right now?
which is, of course, the easier way to go. Pick the low hanging
fruit. Start with the easy dreams and work your way up. It could be
that nothing feels easy
but something is bound to feel easier
than the others.
It
can be hard to put some dreams aside. I have a desktop computer that
is my place to put all of my opinions, ideas and dreams in. This way
it doesn’t feel like they are lost, they are waiting for their
right time to be brought to life. And
sometimes, because
creative dreams are magic,
those dreams sitting in the notebook come true all on their own.
Because they’re been taken out of the bottleneck! Dreams stuck in a
bottleneck tend to not come true.
Scenario
4: You really just don’t know what your dream is:
Ask
yourself: If
I could have anything you want, what would it be?
If you had no limits. None at all. Where
would you live? How would you live? What would you do? How would you
spend your days? How would you feel? What kinds of hobbies would you
have? What would your social life be life? Your romantic life? Your
finances? Your health? Your creativity? Your spirituality?
Somewhere
in all of that there must be something you dream of. Something you
want to build in your world. Your
dreams are about so much more than wanting things to be different
than they are.
Your dreams are how you express your purpose and authenticity and
uniqueness.
Your dreams are healing. Your dreams can make a huge difference.
You
don’t have to know what your dream is before you start working on
it! I
know, that sounds kind of crazy but it’s true. You can make finding
your dream
the dream you work on! Give your dreams a chance and live them you
will be so much happier.
The
Old Sailor,
