Achieving your dreams is an awesome experience. Pursuing your dreams on the other hand is a whole different experience, with both highs and lows. When you embark on a journey of pursuing your dreams, you will go through experiences that will make you wonder if it’s all worth it. For those times, you need a vision so grand and exciting for you that it will spur you on during the hard times. From my experience, the following will happen in the process of following your dreams:
1. Some things are not going to go according to plan or according to your timeline. Know this and be willing to work around it.
2. You will feel like nobody gets you or what you’re doing. Chances are it goes against what they know or have seen in their lives. That’s okay. You’re not doing it for them but for yourself and the people whose lives you’re going to impact.
3. You will go without. Be it money, a place to live, luxuries, nights out, expensive toys etc. For a while, your lifestyle will take a dive. You have to be able to get through that because your dream will test your resolve.
4. You will experience disappointments. It will hurt like crap but you have to keep going. You can pause for a bit to allow yourself time to recharge and process that hurt. Don’t do it for too long though because you still have to get back up and keep going or else everything you would have done until then would have been for nothing.
5. There will inevitably come a point where you want to give up. Be ready for this and have ways to remind yourself why you should keep going.
Knowing all the above through experience, I still pursue my dreams because I know what’s waiting for me on the other side. Do you? Is your vision so amazing and exciting for you that when you fall it won’t allow you to stay down?
How can you minimize the effects of the above?
1. Have a vision for your life that is worth it for you. It has to be able to keep you going because it is that grand and exciting for you. It has to be able to make you wake up in the morning.
2. Dream big. Don’t dream according to what you see around you or what you think is possible in your life. Dream beyond what you could ever believe possible for your life. In case you’re someone who’s starting out and want an example, I’ve described what my future looks like in this post where I share what I believe my Wikipedia page will say in 2029.
3. Believe in your dreams. Expect they will come true before there is any evidence to that effect. In essence, have faith.
4. Visualize your dream life. See yourself living in your dreams. See yourself having achieved all you dream of and experience in your mind what that will look and feel like. Let your mind take you places that your body can’t currently take you.
5. Have a collection of success stories. People who have gotten to the other side. People who have done what you want to do. Not necessarily the same thing but achieved success when it didn’t look like they would. There are many out there. Choose your own, who will act as a reminder that there is an “other side.”
So whether you’re starting out or are already in the process of pursuing your dreams, yes you will experience setbacks but trust me, it will all be worth it one day.
