A couple things you need to know about dreaming, from a life-long dreamer

I'm not sure if this would be better as a series. Maybe I'll write it up and see.

Dreams are just the first step in a journey to discover your hearts desire. They're often heavily influenced by the circumstances we've experienced. We enjoy doing something or like a person who does something and our imagination begins to develop a desire toward doing that. In reality its only one expression of a deeper thing which you might be truly attracted to. 

Anther aspect of dreams is that what we desire to be/do is often not how we'll make money, or even how we'll have our biggest impact. Teachers may desire to impart ideas, but ultimately impact the world by touching young lives. 

Remember the movie "Patch Adams?" The title character discovered a desire to help people in a mental institute. He also discovered that the accepted way to do things was not the most effective way to do it. His desire to help others didn't ultimately lead him to become a medical doctor not a psychiatrist, although his understanding of the human mind influenced his practice of medicine. His unintended impact (beyond the people he helped directly) was that the institutions of medical training had to confront their own inadequacies. 

It's a natural byproduct of coming alive. People who are not alive will try to extinguish your dreams or drown out your impact on the world. That's the battle.

This leads to the third aspect of dreams. When our dreams are opposed, often by well meaning people giving us a reality check, its easy to see those people as our enemies. They aren't. There reality check is an opportunity to refine and deepen our dreams into desires. 

In my case, people kept telling me I'd never make it as an author. I'd need to have a "day job." They were right and I hated them for it. It took years to figure out that I needed something I didn't hate to pay the bills day to day. But I also needed to understand the desires underneath my heart for writing. 

I saw them as sabotaging my efforts and unconsciously I sabotaged there efforts to make me "grow up." A better response would have been to refine my desire.

More to come.