It All Starts With A Dream

We live in a world of sound bites. Snappy slogans that sound great, but all too often mean very little. Either they are promises and commitments that are not backed up by the actions needed to turn them into reality, or they are so vague and high level they are practically meaningless.

One of my favourites is “follow your dreams”. It sounds great, really inspirational. But how useful is advice if it does not change anything in terms of what you are doing or thinking?

The human brain is an incredible thing, but it does have some weaknesses. One is that we struggle to comprehend very large numbers, or concepts generally. For example, the news is filled with references to millions and billions, usually in relation to money or people. We know that a billion is more than a million, and we may even know that a billion is a thousand million. But it is hard to truly comprehend the magnitude of the difference between those 2 numbers because the lower one itself is so large. We need a frame of reference to help us get our heads around them.

So think of it this way. A million seconds is about 11 days. A billion seconds is over 31 years. It is mind-blowing, but it also helps us get some sort of a handle on what we are dealing with.

What has this got to do with following our dreams? I think the way our brain handles an aspiration like this is very similar to the way it grasps (or fails to grasp) the difference between the two big numbers.

When we are advised to follow our dreams, we tend to think about the end result, and where we want to get to. That can feel impossibly far off – how do I get from struggling to eat to being able to travel the world, from being stuck in a dead-end job to being a professional musician, from fighting battles with my mental health every day to being happy and successful? You might as well tell me to walk to the moon. Where do I start?

Just as with the big numbers, our brains cannot process that whole huge journey in one go. What is more, if you are anything like me, you will immediately start to think of all the barriers, both real and imaginary, that will doubtless prove impossible to overcome. In a matter of seconds, I have talked myself out of doing anything at all towards my dream because I cannot see myself crossing the finish line.

It is a bit of an annoying platitude in itself, but what is true is that every journey starts with a single step. The people that did go to the moon started by walking to the bus that took them to the launchpad. Going back even further, they had to learn to walk as children, just like you and I.

What is said much less often but is just as true is that every work of genius begins in the mundane. Nobody jumps straight from nothing to a masterpiece, however talented. Mozart had to spend some time, albeit a lot less than most of us, learning how to read music and play an instrument. All his great compositions must have begun either with him playing around with notes or even just humming a tune.

Shakespeare first had to learn to read and write, and started with a blank piece of paper (or parchment) and something to write with. Da Vinci started the Mona Lisa by first learning how to mix and apply paints to a canvas, and then by making some initial strokes with his brush that probably looked like nothing much at the time.

What makes these geniuses different from most of the rest of us is not how they started. The actions I have mentioned above are things that we could all have a go at today if we really wanted to. What they did differently was that they kept going, even when they felt discouraged or were ridiculed for doing so. Some knew little success in their lifetime – Van Gogh, now revered as one of the greatest artists ever to paint, spent most of his life penniless and battling mental illness. Yet he kept going.

So do follow your dreams. But not in an abstract, one day I will do something about it, kind of way. Do something now, or at least today, towards that dream. Something real and practical, that you could point to if asked. Then take the next step tomorrow, and another the day after. Break your dream down into steps that you can get your head around, and then take them, one after the other.

Not only will you be moving towards where you want to be, rather than just waiting and hoping that it will magically just happen, but you will also be doing a power of good to your mental health because you are making things happen, not letting them happen to you.

If your dream is worth having, it will almost certainly not be easy. You will face barriers and obstacles, and you probably do not know how you will overcome some of them. You may well not even know what some of the barriers are yet. But that is another thing about following our dreams that are often forgotten. The journey is as important as the destination. If it were easy, everybody would do it, and it would be nothing special. It is overcoming the hurdles that make the finishing line worthwhile, however frustrating they may seem at the time.

So keep going. Take a step towards your dream right now, or at least today. Then keep going. It is not just the best way to get there – it is the only way.