Realizing More Dreams
Over the last few days, life in general has become so utterly sweet in that good things seem to be raining upon me from out of what are perfect blue skies. Last Friday, I received a random phone call from an old friend who has decided to write and produce his own movie. I was invited to be a writer on the script and have already begun to make edits and assist with the creative process.
I am being treated to a screenwriting seminar in Las Vegas in early December as part of my reward for helping out. The seminar is put on by Robert McKee who coincidentally is the author of a book about writing screenplays which I'm reading at the moment. It's strange how on the very day I pick up the book and start reading, I find out that I'm going to attend his seminar. Life works in strange ways and for me, it seems to always be for the better right now.
On a sidenote, the AxL Snaks packages are finally in print and should be done sometime next week. From there, I will have the first 1,000 boxes filled with freshly baked Beer Biskits and the first $600 in orders will be sent out right away. I am so incredibly proud of myself for sticking to it and making this happen. I am proud that I am soon going to be earning my own way in life from something I created entirely from scratch over the last seven years. I feel like I'm special in that I don't give up on my dreams, even when the going gets rough. I find that I am being rewarded for my determination...not just in a direct way, but in many other ways as other good things keep rolling in through my open door.
Speaking of rolling, I finally finished the Segway Tour budget and sent it off to the sponsor. I should finish the tour itinerary sometime today and send that off as well. After nearly a year of hitting roadblocks, I am nearing the starting line of creating a small bit of history for myself. I know that this tour will open a multitude of doors for me and my greatest hope is that I get a great publishing deal on the book. I had to revamp my entire book proposal over the last week, but it is finally done and I'm simply waiting on my editor to get back to me, hopefully today with typo-edits, etc. From there, I can quickly turn it around and send it in then patiently wait until I hear back from an agent. I have a strange confidence in myself that I have never known before: that things are finally working out for me in all areas of my life. I have been through some trying times, but I have courageously and doggedly kept moving forward, even in the worst of times as I now find myself in the warm glow of the best of times to come.
I feel grown up. I feel like a man after all of these years of feeling like a boy trapped inside a man's body. It's as if my soul finally let go of fear, of childhood and has matured into the person I have wanted to be but have been afraid to be. I feel "whole" if I may use the term. I feel that the conflict which has been inside of me is now resolved. I marvel that the self-defeating inner voice that has haunted me for so long has finally been laid to rest. My soul is at peace with itself, with who I am and what I am to be. I wish I had taken the time to grow long ago, but I think again, life works in strange ways for strange reasons and I guess that I just had to wait until it was my time to face my fears and overcome them. Sometimes life doesn't work out the way we wish in terms of timing, but in the long run, it does work out in terms of reaching my dreams if I stick to them with all my heart.
These last few months, I felt as if I had lost everything. Now, I am finding that everything has slowly turned around and is gently coming back to me bit by bit, and day by day. I know that over the next few months that I will continue forward as the man that I have grown up to be and that each wish will come true, eventually, in time as it should, in its own special way. I believe that sometimes we have to lose everything in life in order to fully appreciate it to an even higher degree as we work our way back toward it. I believe that everyone faces difficult times in life, especially when going after our dreams. We sometimes find a moment when everything crumbles at our feet and we want to give up on things. Often, we do give up on things, but that is the biggest mistake you can make. In slowly putting pieces into place and working our way back to that we loved, dreamed of and hoped for do we realize the importance of losing something and getting it back by following our hearts and pursuing it in the right way. One cannot grasp in life, one has to let go and then let dreams and happiness slowly come back, gently, like a butterfly.
I keep a card next to my bed which reads:
Happiness is like a buttefly: the more you chase it, the more it will elude you. But if you turn your attnetion to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.
I have learned over the past couple of months that I was chasing happiness too hard when what I needed to do was turn my attention to myself, to looking at who I was and who I could be and then working toward that. I have worked toward it with all of my heart and am finally there...and as life would have it, happiness is starting to sit softly on my shoulder.
I think that sometimes life and not just happiness is like a butterfly. I feel that my life, especially fits the analogy...I have been crawling along, like an ugly caterpillar for so long, afraid to go into the cocoon where I would change and grow and one day break my way out, dry my wings and fly. I finally succumed to nature, I finally crawled into a cocoon and spent time morphing and growing and changing. I feel like over the past few weeks, I have struggled out of the cocoon and spent time letting my wings dry and become strong enough to fly. At last, I am flying with beautiful, colorful wings through a life worth living and being proud of. I am finally that which I have feared to be for so long and I have let go of what I held onto deep inside for no reason.
One cannot fear change, one cannot fear growing up and one cannot fear success, happiness and love. For in doing so, one never changes, one never grows and never reaches success, finds happiness or accepts love. I have learned much, I have grown much more and I am so proud to be where I am in life and where I am going. It has taken me some time, but I know that I have emerged, finally and am now the man that I am meant to be. A man who will find an uncommon success in life, a man who will have unparalleled happiness and a man who will someday experience a love beyond compare.
I was talking with a friend over the weekend about pain, loss, difficult times and how it seems that those people who go through the most difficult times often turn out to be the best in life. Those who face no hardship, who face no disappointment, never seem to have a reason to be strong, never seem to have a spirit within them which shines out from among the mundaness of every day life. I know that I have had more than my share of difficult times in life and though I used to hate what has happened to me, I know am grateful that I had the opportunity to overcome it all and grow and learn and become an incredibly strong spirit and soul capable of doing so much in life.
With that, I must now continue to fly through the blue skies surrounding me as my worst is behind me and the best is yet to come.
Living A Full Life
Everyone wants to be free but those who are truly free compromise security. ~ Tom Robbins
Today, I began to think about how I live life to a degree. I thought about all the ways in which I could live it and I thought about how I do live it. I thought about the meaning of security and how for me, pursuing security in a normal job, with a normal paycheck, married and living in a house in the suburbs which looks exactly like every house around it, would mean the end of freedom, it would mean death to my soul, it would mean giving up and never daring to do great things.
Granted, I have tried often to do great things and in many ways, I have invariably failed. I skated for over fifteen years to pursue a spot on the Olympic Team. I did not make it, but I did not fail. I succeeded in trying bravely. I have risked my heart in love and lost. But I did not fail. I succeeded in knowing that I am worthy of love, someday because I am not afraid to let go of my heart completely. Yes, I have been hurt, but not to the degree that I am unable to forgive and still love as if I'd not been hurt. For that, I am not a failure...I am still free. I have risked my money in starting my own business and in trying to become a writer. I have not had financial success nor have I published a book, but I have not failed. I have succeeded in continuing to live according to my own rules without letting society dictate my path, the path of security, boredom and a mundane soul. I have succeeded in maintaining my enthusiasm through every shortcoming. I have succeeded in pushing on when I felt I couldn't go on. I have succeeded in knowing that wishes do come true if you stay true to your heart. I have succeeded in staying true to my heart and one by one, my wishes are now coming true as a result.
I used to think that I was an utter failure in life, in all ways, end to end. Now, as I think about it, I have not failed, I have only succeeded in not altering the way I live life by not giving in to the non-freedom of security. I used to think that I was boring, that I was unnecessary in this life, that I didn't matter. Now, I know that I am not boring, I am necessary and I do matter. I am finding that the world needs people like me, those willing to risk everything, willing to risk pain and discomfort and uncertainty in an effort to move forward and do great things while alive. I am finding that I am here and through my writing, I change lives for the better. I inspire and I give hope and courage to others because I have hope and courage for myself and I live in a way that shines brightly so that others may see and learn and grow. I give to the world in a way that only I can and not a day goes by that I do not thank God that I am different enough to make a difference in others' lives. I used to think that I was not special. I am finding that I am special because I do things in life and create things of my own doing where others would have simply given up hope. I am special because I fight for that which I believe in and eventually I succeed in all things I set my heart to. That is rare and if nothing else, a gift from God that I am tenacious, daring, courageous and determined. I am finding the world needs people like me because without people like me to inspire through the way we live, no one would dare to chase dreams.
I used to think that I had lost everything. I am finding that I have gained everything in that I have not lost myself. I have remained true to my heart and know that I always will. I have always chased my dreams and always will without bowing to the pressures of society to fall into place, to fall into security where there is no freedom, no risk and only mild rewards.
I believe that if you do not risk being on your own and chase a dream, that you will truly never know what you are made of. When you are not on your own, you are not free but rather you are tied to security. In tying yourself to security, you may think you are free, but you are only trying to sail with one foot on the dock, afraid to stand on your own, amidst your own fears, facing success without the ability to risk everything and gain everything.
I used to fear being alone. Now I embrace it. I am finding that the more I am alone, the stronger I am and the more I come to know myself and all that I am capable of. I am finding that sometimes others held me back, that I made decisions based on what others needed from me rather than what I needed for myself. I gave myself away and my dreams away, too.
As I think about life, I think about what it would be like to have a dream but give up on it merely for the sake of someone else. I think this is probably one of the biggest mistakes that someone could make. I did this once, but I will never do it again. I gave up on a dream because someone loved me and didn't want me to move far away. I let go of the dream when I should have let go of the person who was so selfish that they only held me back. I learned that in giving up on my dream I lost everything I thought I might gain by letting it go. I thought I would find love and that would be enough. I learned that it is not love if the other person cannot let go of you so you can chase a your dream. I took the path of security and lost freedom. I lost what I thought was love and my dream was gone as well.
I found that dreams are very precious in that for many of them, you only have a certain time in life when you can go after them. This is why it's important to go after them at the points in your life where you can risk everything and lose it all. If you do not risk everything then you truly are not trying with everything you have and it could be enough to hold you back from actually making your dream real. If there is anything in your mind or heart which conflicts with your dream, you will lose them both in time. You will lose your dream because you have not let go completely to it and then you lose what held you back out of regret that it cost you your dream. I have learned in life and truly believe that this is especially true of people. That when we hold back because of someone else, we lose both our dreams and that person somehow. I can't explain it, I just know it happens as it's happened to me many times. I believe that dreams require a choice. You have to choose between losing a person in your life and losing a dream. I believe that you have to be willing to give up that person in order to chase your dream. If you do not, you cannot fully chase the dream as they hold you back from it in some way, even though they don't mean to. It's human nature and most people can't cope with competing with your dreams. So you have to choose between a life of knowing you had a dream but didn't go after it, and a life with the person who held you back from being you. Freedom or security. You cannot have both.
I used to think I had failed when I didn't achieve my dreams even when I tried my hardest, even when I let go of others to purse the dreams. I'm not sure that I can call this failure in any way. What I have done is succeed in that I risked something, I risked security in chasing a dream. I also risked losing but I did not risk dying an unlived life. I found that in all of the great risks I have taken and in all the losses which have occured, I did not lose myself. Rather I found what I was made of. I found myself to always be strong enough and have the courage enough to continue living free. I found myself continuing to chase dreams rather than give up and be shackled to security in another person or in a normal job. I believe that eventually, by compromising security, I will find a success far beyond that which I could find in taking the cautious, secure route in life. I've found that people's hearts change, back and forth, on a whim. I found that in giving up a dream in exchange for security in love, that love left and I had nothing. I have learned to stick to my dreams, on my own, in my own way and forego security that others might offer in a fleeting moment of supposed happiness.
There are times when I crave security. I crave financial security, I crave the security of a loving relationship and I crave the security of a stable, day to day life. However, when I think about it, and stretch it out in my mind over years to come, I find that it would be the death of my soul. I do not wish to get to the end of my life, only to look back and say, "well...you never risked, but you never lost."
Instead, I find that I am one of the few people in life with enough courage and conviction to dare to chase a dream, come what may. I think that sometimes I am here in life in order to inspire others, if not myself. I remind myself that unless I dare to chase my dreams, I am daring to do nothing. I am giving up, I am stepping onto the conveyor belt of security that will only move me toward a life without any greater purpose or meaning.
Part of this came from asking a lot of people I've met recently. As I prepare for the Segway Tour I'm about to leave on, I run into folks left and right. When I tell them what I'm doing, "chasing a dream" they often get a sort of blank look in their eyes. I then ask if they've ever had a dream.
Sadly, 99% of them do not have a dream. They simply work, day to day and live their lives out, draining time minute by minute. For some reason, this really strikes me as odd. It's as if they're living "the American Dream" so much that society has washed away any dreams of their own from their hearts and minds.
I think about how I could so very easily be that way, living a life of stability instead of a life of risk and passion and daring. I picture what it would be like to have a steady income, a good-sized bank account and a house in the suburbs which looks exactly like every other house in the same suburb. To me, that would be a death before dying. Then again, I'm different. I guess for some reason, I don't see the point but instead I see a world of infinite possibility. I know that I felt like I was having a good time as I wasted away five years sitting at a desk and earning a paycheck, and I know that I could go and do that again, right now. I know that I could earn enough for a down payment on a house and I could earn enough to sock away some cash for retirement. But I believe that life is about more than that, at least it is for me and not to toot my own horn, but I must admit that I am severely proud of myself for having the courage to live in an unconventional way.
I have the courage to risk and to lose, knowing that I will always find a way to get by. I also know that in doing so, someday I will be richly rewarded financially beyond the rich rewards I've received from the memories I have created in being the way I am. I cannot tell you that I can even remember one day spent at my desk, no matter how much I achieved or accomplished in that day. I can tell you that I recall every day of every thing I've done in life where I took a risk and went after a dream. I recall each day of building my own business, I recall each day of writing on a book I hope to publish, I recall each day of my cross-country bicycle trip and I recall each day of sailing in the Caribbean, climbing mountains or watching a sunrise in the middle of nowhere. Nights I spent looking up at stars and finding constellations stand out in my mind vividly, while nights spent watching football games all run together in a muck of bland, burned minutes lived without passion. I feel the world is here to be seen, to be tasted, to be explored.
God, I pray, save me from a cookie-cutter house in the suburbs. Save me from a steady paycheck. Save me from the soul-sucking stability of a normal job. God, grant me the courage to step out, the courage to chase a dream, the courage to live in my own way apart from the average person shackled to a security in the love of others or the lov of money. Thank you, God for letting me snorkel among tropical fish, for letting me walk on white sand beaches, for letting me stand atop a 14,000 foot mountain alone before snowboarding down. Thank you for giving me the strength to endure 3700 miles alone on a bicycle, for I have done something not many have done which I proudly can take to my grave. I cannot take a single day of a real job to my grave with me for it is nothing but a vaporous blank existence.
God, grant me the determination to become a writer, to produce works of art for others to enjoy, to do the things that only I am capable of doing. Thank you, God for not letting the spark that is in my heart go out but rather that you have fanned the flames and kept them going so that I continue forward in pursuit of dreams rather than risk nothing and give up to lead a mundane existence. God, I pray tonight before I go to sleep that you will continue to give me the strength to freely follow my dreams by letting go of security so that I might find true freedom,true success and true happiness rather than the fleeting, promised love and happiness that others offer but always fail to keep.
I have found that in being truly free, I am secure in myself in a way that no one and no normal career and no paycheck can offer. I am me, through and through, in my heart and that is all I can be or need to be.