What was your dream when you were little? Maybe to be an astronaut, or a professional footballer or a film star. Perhaps something more pragmatic – my cousin always said when he was young that he wanted to be a lollipop man because you didn’t start work till you were 65.
So funny.
It is good to dream. Even flights of fantasy dreams that are unlikely to come to fruition inspire in us a creative thinking process that can be insightful. These dreams usually have some element in what we want and value most in life, and therefore paying attention to what is under the surface can be very fruitful. Plus this kind of dreaming is great fun – who hasn’t dreamt of owning a holiday property/boat/surf school/vineyard whilst on holiday?
When you think of where you are today, how much of that was a long-ago-held dream, no matter the magnitude?
What does it take to inspire the dream in you?
Who has inspired you in the seeking out of that dream?
And who have you inspired, told them that you believe in them? This is the time of year when graduations are a-plenty. So many hopes and dreams of these bright young people, including one of our own Nearest-and-Dearest (see my musings of last time). Where will they be in 5, 10, 15 years from now?
Those who inspire the dream in us.
In thinking about this, I am more aware than ever of the people in my life who support me, encourage me, believe in me and enable me to keep being and going and doing.
When I left a secure job (with secure pay and a pension) and jumped off that cliff to become self employed as a Life coach 10 years ago, I am so grateful for colleagues who told me at the time that this was a good fit for me and I was not completely bonkers.
Friends who hold my cherished dreams tenderly and remind me of them or listen as I rehearse them again to become re-envisioned when I might otherwise give up.
Precious folk who affirm me in what I am doing, and who I am becoming in the process.
Friends who give feedback, challenge me, act as a sounding board, respond to requests for help, point me towards useful information and new ideas.
And of course, my Nearest-and-dearest who have been part of the process of change and without whom I couldn’t do what I am doing.
So if you are reading this and you are one of the aforementioned, a huge thank you for who you are and what you bring to my life.
And the challenge in this is to think:
For whom can I be that person?
For whom can I inspire the dream, encourage them to believe that they are and can?
Whose dreams can I show interest in that prompts the dreamer to more self belief and possibly action? None of us get to where we are in isolation. We all to a certain extent stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us.
Furthermore, none of us is an island, we need each other in this tricky, complicated world and who knows, you might be just the person that someone else out there needs today to bring that word of affirmation and encouragement.
Inspire the dream in someone this week – cheesy but powerful.