It’s easy to get caught up in the hierarchy of the mind. Obstacles and irritations tend to be front and center with necessities like cooking, cleaning, and working coming in a strong second. It’s a hamster-wheel kind of thinking, round and round we go, covering the same territory over and over again. Maybe we get restless or bored with our routine and begin planning for something a little different, like a vacation or renovating the kitchen. But we’ll keep missing what’s nagging at us until we stop filling every available moment with mindless doing. That’s when the dreams we’ve pushed to the side have a chance to resurface.
These don’t have to be life-altering dreams, like flying to Katmandu or floating down the Nile in a felucca. We can take baby steps. Maybe there is a class we’ve always wanted to take on foraging for mushrooms, or we want to learn to paddleboard or paint. The scary truth is we can stop ourselves from naming even our smallest dreams because we’re afraid of failing, before we’ve even begun we’ve already resigned ourselves to it not working out. Then there are the big dreams we’ve abandoned or perhaps even a profession we didn’t follow because there was no money in it, or it just didn’t seem practical, or maybe no one would understand us. But there is no one stopping us now from being a part-time poet, guitar player, or potter, or anything else for that matter. Only we can stop ourselves from going after the dreams that matter the most to us.
Certainly there are plenty of dreams that never see the light of day because we’re just too busy. But I think farther behind that there is a sadness we can’t bear to face. It’s our deep regret about not listening more closely to what our heart and soul are begging us for. Remember, it doesn’t have to be a major undertaking to make a major impact, it just has to be personally meaningful and fulfilling. The reality is we can start creating a place for more of what we love in our existing lives without a lot of rearranging. In doing so we may come to find out that there is a lot more overlap then we first thought. Sometimes our dreams just need a little tweaking.
Getting started is easy, begin planting the seeds of what speaks to your soul and see what takes root. Gradually weaving your deepest dreams into your daily routine is a life-changing process and sometimes happens without a lot of pomp and circumstance. And then something amazing happens, once we begin uncovering more of what we love the floodgates open and all kinds of new and inspiring dreams begin to take shape. These are the dreams we have for ourselves that don’t have a name yet. Finding them only takes our curiosity and willingness to begin something new, and the first step is saying yes to something that is out of our comfort zone.
This is powerful territory, and if we can bring an open mind and heart we may be shocked at what we find, at what begins to fall away, and what takes center stage. This is a place where we have the potential to recreate our lives just by paying a little more attention to what is on the horizon. So, how do we get to the unnamed dreams that want to be born?
We start by keeping it simple, we add more quiet time and give ourselves permission to just be. This helps create a bit more spaciousness for something else to arise. If you want to make a list go ahead. Making lists are an excellent way for bringing what’s underneath out into the open and that helps create more space for the unexpected to make itself known. Any way you look at it a little more solitude opens the door to what the heart and soul are longing for. Think of long walks in the woods, a quiet cup of tea, or sitting under the stars at night. These are some of the small, ordinary moments that let the mind and body take a breath and reboot. It’s also the perfect time for a new dream to slip in and reveal itself.
What are your new dreams that are asking to be brought to life?
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