Dream Your Own Dream

What have I learned in the months since I’ve written? Quite a bit actually, but I didn’t realize it until this morning. As you may know I have coached my daughter’s cross country team for the past two years and our season recently ended. It was bittersweet for me since she’s a senior and the majority of my team was seniors. Most of them will not run in college but ran to stay in shape, so I was especially proud to take five of the ten athletes to the state meet this year. With that being said, my daughter has been waiting to hear whether she was accepted into her top college choice as a runner. She finally received confirmation in the mail, along with a substantial scholarship, not enough to pay for the entire year but enough to get her started. It started a difficult conversation where she articulated her dreams and said we did not have to be included (we did not have to live close). I’m sure many parents have been there. Their kids have decided they have it all figured out and don’t need them anymore, even though the parents in their wisdom know they will and the kids will figure that out soon enough. My husband and I are keeping our options open and didn’t say anything, even though I was hurt. I have been looking at lots of different career options and the thought of teaching college at an actual university and not just to high school juniors and seniors has always been a dream of mine. It was not something my daughter wanted me to do, especially not at a college where she planned to attend. She wanted to live her own dream without her mother. After hearing her very passionate arguments, I don’t blame her. She’s entitled to her own dreams and what she told me made sense. Here’s what she said.

I wasn’t dreaming big enough. I wasn’t dreaming my own dreams. I was essentially tagging along behind her dream. I thought about it and she’s right. What happened to my dreams? Yes, I’d like to teach college, but even more so, I’d rather be a full-time writer. That’s why I started this blog, so I would keep my skills sharp and develop my writing voice. I’d like to continue writing my next novel in the series. However, I also need to pay bills, which means I also need a job, but that does not mean I need to sacrifice my dreams. She told me about a visual she uses that I’d like to share. Instead of the angel and devil on your shoulder telling what you should and shouldn’t do, she has a goal-setter who sits in the middle who urges her to go for it. This little muscled-up figure taunts her to achieve her goals by saying she can’t, which makes her to do just the opposite and sure enough, she gets the job done. I envision the demigod from Moana that looks like The Rock as my goal-setter, but as my daughter talked to me about this, she said my goal setter obviously had not been working out very much since I was not bulking up on some big goals and seemed to have sight of my dreams. She’s not wrong. I haven’t been doing much dreaming at all lately. I’ve been pretty much in survival mode for quite a while. Why is that? I know the reasons and now it’s time to build myself and my goal-setter back up. It’s time to dream big and put myself first. Obviously, my daughter has learned how to do that for herself, so why can’t I do the same? I think it’s time that I get back to my dreams. Be prepared to see some changes. Life is short and each moment is precious and I want every one of them to count!