Dream Big / Act Small
I’ve been thinking a lot about how the dream I’m chasing is bigger than anything I’ve ever undertaken before.
Sometimes this voice in my head says, “You really think you’re going to do this?”
That voice used to make me change my direction. It used to convince me that what I want from life is impossible. Now, it makes me double down.
Older me is tired of cutting myself short of where I’d like to be. Long-term goals are hard because we convince ourselves in the early planting stages that our time is better spent elsewhere. We let that voice tell us, “This isn’t going to grow. Even if it does, it’s a gamble.” We play the worst case scenarios in our heads, and talk ourselves out of big ideas. How many seeds have we planted and walked away from— or worse yet, never planted?
My blog today is an affirmation of my goals and ideas, a verbal vision board. In the last 5 years I have learned a lot about myself. I have collected a set of random skills, and I’ve got a crazy goal that puts them all to great use. Someday, I will host Artist Residencies and Retreats in the Andes Mountains of South America. I studied abroad there, and I never wanted to come home. It’s my entire life’s ambition to get back there and stay put. I dream at night of building by the river with my spouse and children, and sometimes I even dream in Spanish. Some day, I’ll drink my morning coffee in the misty yard, watching the hummingbirds take turns at the feeder.
Today, I’m going to do my homework. Here, in Ohio. I listen to the rain outside, and the happy chirping cardinals. The sun works to illuminate the day through the overcast… maybe I could see a rainbow, if I looked for one.
I think sometimes the huge gap between where we are right now and where our dreams land can discourage us. I’m 2,961 miles away from where I want to be (literally), and I think that what’s different about me now compared to before I had dreams is that that distance excites me now. It motivates me; it makes me work that much harder every day in service of the life I wish to lead. When I forwent my biggest dreams, I spent every spare moment I had trying to escape myself. Boredom was an invitation to have a drink, or “try to relax”. Now, every day, I do one thing to bring me closer to my Big Goal(TM). It’s the small actions that become the future you.
I read somewhere once that “your life today is a reflection of your actions six months ago”. Life has this input/output or effort/reward system, and it’s on a bit of a lag. The best parts/ rewards of growth and change come after the growing and changing. (and those parts are the painful ones!) Little charges on your credit card turn into a decently large bill after a while. One day sober at a time for me has turned into 4+ years without drinking. The Big Book of AA gives a metaphor, the building of a great wall, and tells of how it comes about by placing a single brick at a time. I think that faith is a quality that many people don’t fully understand and have trouble working with.
I’m thinking a lot lately with graduation on the horizon, about how every large undertaking is just a series of tiny accomplishments put together. I didn’t “go get my degree”— I signed up. Then, I picked some classes. Then, I attended the first one. I wrote a paper. I went to galleries. I wrote another paper. I picked more classes.
Eventually, these actions turned into the having of a degree. I had to believe that it could be kept up for 4-5 years, and that got SO MUCH easier when I didn’t have to do it all at once in my head. I can’t wait to apply this thinking to my other goals.
You don’t have to do the Big Thing(TM) all at once. What’s one little thing that you could do today that would support your Big Thing(TM)?
