When I was a child, I used to write and draw my own comic books. I had a whole binder full of various heroes and villains I had created. I dreamed of the day when I would be a grown up writing comic books for real. Imagined the touching fan mail I would receive and how the fan boys would interrogate me at the comic conventions for some tiny little juicy tidbit of information about what was going to happen to their favorite characters.
Changes are when you were a child you had such dreams of your own. Of being a music star, a major league sports player, a model, a doctor, a airline attendant or whatever your heart desired.
Whatever happened to those dreams? If you are like most people, they somehow got lost in the process of growing up. You had to set them aside and 'get real'. Find a 'real' job and make ends meet. Some of you may have kept a little fire burning for your dreams but the sad truth is most people just abandon them. Instead they allow society to mold them. They fall into a career, make a decent living and just accept that as the way it is.
They go through life comfortably but without content. Something is missing and they know it. Sure they have a spouse, kids, a home, a car, a dog or cat and enough money to live comfortably but it all seems somehow unfulfilling still. Sure they like their job but it's not the job they really want to have. The house may serve adequately and harbour fond memories but it's not the home they really desired. The car or two certainly gets you around but it's not the car they want to be seen in.
However the single biggest factor in the discontentment is the fact that they simply don't know what it is they they even want. They have no clear idea what career they would rather be doing, what their dream house would actually look like or even what car they would own if their was no limit to what they could choose. They have given up on their dreams. Instead they have only loosely defined wants and desires with no passion behind then whatsoever.
Without vivid dreams life has no passion. Without passion life loses it's flavour. It's like steak without salt or condiment. It may fill your belly but you don't really enjoy the experience the way your know you should.
When you goto a restaurant the first thing they ask when you order steak is how you like it. What type of steak do you want? How do you want it cooked? Do you want mushrooms on that? What sides would you like? I bet you could quickly answer all those questions with little thought but when it comes to the steak of life are your answers so clear? They should be.
Before you can actually engage life and live it on your own terms you must clearly understand what those terms are, otherwise you are doomed to failure as you'll aimlessly zig and zag uncertain of where you're going. That's like going on a long roadtrip without a destination. You'll end up somewhere but without a clear objective you'll probably settle for the first decent thing that comes along. Which is probably how you got to where you are now in the first place.
Dust those old dreams off or chart out new ones!
Take 10 minutes right now and write out what you would like to do with your life. For now, put absolutely no limitations on your dreams. If you would like to visit the space shuttle, write it down. If you dream of marrying a movie star jot that down. Want millions and millions of dollar? Write down an amount irregardless of how crazy it seems. Go crazy, these are your dreams after all. Dreams are suppose to be the stuff of fantasy, it's goals that need to seem achievable and we'll cover that later.
Make 4 lists - Love and Social goals, Finacial & Career goals, Fun/Toy/Adventure goals, Life Enhancement / Charity goals.
Social goals are all your romantic notions, friends you'd like to have, social status you would like to obtion, etc.
Finacial & Career goals set what you want to be doing with your life and what that will look like. How much you want to earn, house you want to have, etc.
Fun/Toy/Adventure goals are spice of life. Where do you want to travel? What activities would you like to do? Do you want a sports car or outroad vehicle?
Life Enhancement & Charity goals are those things that will make you feel better and more complete about yourself. Want to learn more languages? How to dance? It's also important to have charitable goals too. You cannot recieve without giving so define what you want to give back to this world and how. Do you want to be a big brother/sister? Want to travel to some staving nation and distribute aid? Or finally start tithing a full 10%.
Spend 2-3 minutes on each. Just let it flow. Be crazy and adventureous and have fun!
Continue reading once you've finished.
Done? Okay...
Put a timeline beside each goal. Whatever you think is a reasonable amount of time for you to achieve that goal.
Then pick one 1 yr goal, one 10 yr goal and one lifetime goal for each list.
For each of those write out two paragraphs. The first paragraph says why this is an important dream. How it'll make you feel. What benefits it would bring to your life or those around you. The second paragraph says what the repercussions of never accomplishing that dream would be. How would that make you feel? What lost opportunties does that create? Make these paragraphs as compelling as you can.
Now transcribe all that onto a sheet of paper or series of card and put that somewhere where you'll see it everyday. Review it twice a day, everyday until it's ingrained into your subconscious. This is where you are heading in life and why. Once that becomes a part of your make-up you will automatically start seeing all sorts of potentials for getting there that you never even realized before because now your mind it aware that this is what it should be looking for.
