Everyone has dreams. You may dismiss them, wish them into your life, or escape into them, but there is always one inside you. What do you do with your dream? Have you ever tried to pursue it actively? Have you ever attempted to make your dream your life’s reality? This is life’s biggest challenge and one of the most significant opportunities for you to grow as a person.

If you’re not following your dream right now, what’s stopping you? Is it the responsibilities you have that hold you back from the pursuit of a goal that seems self-indulgent? Is it the risk of discovering that you can’t have the dream you’ve spent years nurturing in your heart? Could it be the fear that once you capture your vision, there will be nothing left inside you to continue going? Or is it, perhaps, the fear of discovering that the dream wasn’t really what you thought it would be when you achieve it?

All of these things are valid concerns. Risk, disappointment, unfulfilled expectations, irresponsibility, and fear are all-powerful deterrents. And, yet, if you do begin to follow your dream, what will happen? What’s your reward for overcoming all the conflict these deterrents will greet you with? You will discover who you are.

 

Don’t Give Up!

As you meet resistance on the path to your dream, you’ll discover strength, beauty, depth, and talent you never knew were within you. And once you set out on this path, who knows what opportunities you’ll encounter along the way?

Each step towards your dream is a chance for you to discover other dreams, skills, friendships, interests, and passions. With each step taken, comes hundreds of new paths to walk — if you wish to pursue other dreams.

Sometimes it’s the path you walk to follow your dream that’s important, not realizing the dream. With every day and every new experience, you change. And, as you continue to walk the path to your vision, the dream may change. This is not a lack of focus or commitment. Changing the nature or substance of your desires is called growth. How can anything that reveals more of who you are to yourself be destructive or irresponsible or selfish?

Of course, as you walk the path you’ve chosen, there is also the possibility that you may lose the dream for a while. You may travel quite a distance and suddenly decide that the dream isn’t attainable. You may not be able to capture the dream as you have envisioned it. But dreams are never gone forever.

Have faith in yourself. Stop for a time, look around you, and then look within. What have you learned in pursuing this dream? Is there anything in the experiences, feelings, and knowledge you’ve acquired that point you toward another dream? Can you modify the dream you have? With an open mind and a few questions, you will find your dream again or discover a new one. Keep searching.

It is no failure to have walked a path halfway instead of to the end. All the discoveries you’ve made stay with you regardless of what path you choose. You never lose these.

Every Step Is Valid

So, no single day, hour, or minute when you seek your dream, any dream, is ever wasted. When you seek a dream, you seek yourself. Finding out who you are and sharing yourself with people is life. And what better way to discover yourself and share what you’ve learned with those around you than following your heart’s desires?

Eventually, there are only two courses you can travel to. You can bury your dreams and live a contented life allowing experiences, opportunities, and chances for happiness and growth to come to you as they may. Or, you can decide to fulfill your life’s potential and take that first step on the path to your dream.

The chance may not reveal you to yourself. Seek out who you are while there is still time. Take that first step and follow your dream.