Are You Dreaming Patiently?
This post is part of the Guest Blog Grand Tour over at Life Without Pants – an epic two-month journey of over 50 guest posts. Want to learn more about Matt Cheuvront & see how far the rabbit hole goes? Subscribe to the Life Without Pants RSS feed & follow him on Twitter to keep in touch!
There’s a lot of talk these days about going everything we can to reach our dreams…wait, where am I?
Yeah, so all that talk about reaching our dreams, throwing a middle finger up to the naysayers, and doing whatever the hell you want – it sounds great, and I’m not here to tell you that you shouldn’t be doing all that.
What a lot of people don’t want to admit is that breaking all the rules and achieving the impossible doesn’t happen overnight – and when we can’t see the end, when our dreams seem too far away, that’s when we lose hope, slow down, and give up.
Take a deep breath and take wisdom in the words of GNR. All we need is just a little patience.
I want to write a book…several actually. I want to start my own business, open a coffee shop, travel the world, the works. I have a list (literally) of things I want to accomplish in my life -those BHAGs (big hairy audacious goals) that loom over the long and windy road ahead of me.
The difference between me and a lot of people is that I’m willing to work, and work hard, to achieve these dreams. I’m patient enough to know that I may have to work at a non-dream job to gain experience, and, you know, make a little money – ‘cause that’s nice too.
The first step is identifying what your dreams are – no matter how ridiculous or far off they seem – if you don’t know what you’re working toward, if there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, you’ll end up wandering around in the dark without a flashlight. And FYI, no dream is ridiculous if YOU believe in it.
The next step is to start doing something about it. If you want to be a writer, start a blog, buy a spiral notebook, head to your local Starbucks and start writing things down.
If you want to start a business – do some research, open a savings account, set a budget, and get to work.
It’s nice to talk about dreams – it’s fine to lay in bed at night wondering “what if” – but things only start happening when you start taking action – and things have a funny way of happening sooner when you set goals to work toward.
And don’t get discouraged – don’t expect things to happen all at once. It’s OK to take things slow – it’s OK to relax and enjoy the ride along the way.
I’ll be the first to tell you that life’s rules are meant to be broken – that you shouldn’t settle for the routine, but don’t get so caught up on the end goal that you forget what life is really all about. Living.
Note from Jen: A big thank you to Matt for visiting us on his Guest Blog Grand Tour. If you haven’t already, I would highly recommend a visit to Life Without Pants for a perspective on life less restricted!