Babies are like Dreams

image by dorina dubceac


 I had a dream last night.  In this dream I had a baby. I went through labor and delivery and also saw the baby come out of me.  She was a beautiful baby girl.  Then the attendants took the baby and put her on the counter on the other side of the room.  Then they all left. Being week from birth I couldn't get up to go to the baby.  I called but no one came. It was up to me. I finally managed to get up and go to the baby and hold it and nurture it and love it.

Then I had another dream.  In this dream I am trying to analyze the baby dream.  What I decide in the dream is that the baby is one of my creative dreams.  I have set it on a table and left it to flounder on its own. This got me to thinking about my dreams and how I put things off all the time.  I may have a busy few days and think oh I will do some filming on say Thursday when I have few commitments but then Thursday comes and I find some way to not work on it. It may be fear of doing it right, or fear of not being good enough or any number of the other thousands of things we mistakenly tell ourselves.

So you can think of an abandoned baby as abandoned dreams. Babies and dreams need so much care.  That book is never going to be written if you only work on it one day a week. The class you are developing will lose its momentum if you don't just face your fears and work on it. Or even someone else will come out with what you were planning to do but just never got the nerve to do it. That happened to me.  I was going to write a mystery with knitting as the setting and no I didn't do it.  Now there are dozens of books out there like that.  I missed my chance. The Universe gives you ideas and you really do need to act on them.  If you don't someone else will.

Do you have dreams that you start and then let slide.  You lose so much by having to start again.  You never really can just pick up where you left off.  There is momentum and excitement involved and often you have to recreate that again and again.  The result is you waste a lot of time going forward and back. Maybe its time to pick up that dream and focus all your attention on it.  You would do that with a baby.  Now do it with those dreams you've been harboring.

Today my intention is to face those fears, pick up that dream and go for it.

Following Dreams

A few weeks ago I was at coffee hour talking to one of our church members and we were talking about our college age kids.  I had mentioned that Sarah had one this big writing award and that she was graduating in a couple months. When I mentioned that she wanted to be a writer and I got that look again and the comment 'is she planning on starving'.

I think I went on to say something else but his comment bothered me.  When I discuss this at other times people always say 'Is she going to teach? And I say no she is not interested in teaching, then you get the look again.  That oh why didn't you have her get a teaching certificate anyways, or she'll be living in your basement for years look.  Why is it when you have a creative career people always want you to do something else too?

This having an creative dream and following through is so hard when no one supports you. I have never heard promising comments from another adult when I mention my daughters chosen career.  Tell me why aren't people saying, Oh she got her degree, great, that should open some doors for her, or she won that writing award,  that is the first of many she will win.  Or I can't wait to see her books at Barnes and Noble.  Why does everyone assume that she will not succeed.With all this negativity its amazing anyone follows their dream, that anyone succeeds.

Where would the world be if JK Rowling never followed her dream of being a published writer, or Monet who struggled all his life or Van Gogh who I think sold one painting in his lifetime. Why aren't people more supportive.  I just don't understand it.

When Sarah graduated from High School this is what she said about her career goals.  "I am going to write an award winning novel that will be made into an academy award winning motion picture." I loved the strength of that goal. I made her promise to take me on the red carpet when that happens. I don't hear her saying that statement anymore.  I hope the opinions of others have not squashed that dream of hers.  She is a fantastic writer and I know she will be successful.