To Dream or Not to Dream...

When you are a kid everyone tells you to go for your dreams, and dream big!  They say you can be whatever you want to be when you grow up.  So as a kid you think of the coolest job you can imagine because at that point you don't even care about money yet.  So you dream up all the things that you see on TV and read about in school.  Some kids want to be astronauts, some want to be famous singers, others want to be a movie stars.  I personally wanted to play for the Boston Red Sox.  When you are young these things don't seem so out of reach.  Well as you grow a bit older, you begin to realize that some of your dreams may not be so realistic.  You can't be an astronaut if you get sick just from going on a roller coaster,  and you can't be a famous singer if your shower head can't even stand your voice.  During your teenage years you begin to figure out what your strengths are, and you proceed to formulate goals which seem slightly more realistic than the whimsical fantasies of your childhood.  Now Im not saying that you can't be a professional baseball player or a movie star.  If in high school you find yourself starring in everyone one of the schools theatrical productions, or as the star pitcher of your baseball team then maybe those are paths you should pursue.  But for most of us, what we long to do as a child ends up not being quite as easy to accomplish as we had hoped.  Even though we may not all be cut out to be in the movies, that certainly does not mean we cannot all find a career which we love.  And just because you have grown more mature it does not mean you can't still have dreams.

When I was in the final months of my high school career I formed a band with some of my close friends.  At first we began playing music for fun but as time went on it became something more, it became a dream.  We released some music and our friends seemed to like it.  So we released some more music, and people seemed to genuinely enjoy listening to it.  We figured if we could just get more exposure and more fans maybe we could really make something out of this band thing.  But time goes by and "life happens" as one of my friends likes to say, and we still hadn't got to the point we had hoped, and the band became stagnant.  This band life was my dream as a young adult.  I watch these bands, whom I loved, play their music for big crowds every night and drive around the country with their best friends, and I wanted to do that! I wanted it so bad, and I still want that.  I don't care about being famous or making loads of money, I just want to do something I know I'll love.  And obviously there are lots of bands out there who tour and make a living at it.  Why couldn't I do that too?

There comes a point though, in your life when you have to make a decision on what you want to go for. But my question is, when is that point?  When do you let go of your dreams and begin working toward something that is more safe?  Sadly I don't have the answer for that question.  It is something that has consumed so much of my thoughts.  So I ask you, is there a time to move on from your dreams?  Or should you never let go and keep chasing it until you you've either caught it or no longer have the energy or will to continue?  Theres really no right or wrong answer to these questions, and Im very interested to see what people think!

Into the Real World

I recently turned twenty years old, and when you are nineteen, you still feel like a kid. You feel like nothing can touch you.  You are right out of high school, still immature in many ways, still naive to what the "real world" is like in many ways.  But eventually you have to start making important decisions about your future, and that can be a really tough thing. Society tells us you have to go to college to be successful and get a good job, and that may be true in many ways, but it forces you to make some tough decisions at an early age.  How, when you are eighteen years old, do you choose the career that you are going to pursue for the next 2-8 years of college?  It can lead to severe stress and anxiety when you are a senior in high school.

All through school I was one of those kids who would procrastinate until I absolutely had to do something, and I did the same thing with college.  Upon graduating high school with grades which were good, not great,  I decided to try out community college.  After one semester decided it wasn't really what I was looking for.  So I decided to take some time off from school, get a job and save as much money as I could. Well after and year and a half of working two different jobs, waiting tables, and working at a distribution center,  and saving no money, I decided it was definitely time to go back to college so I could pursue a career in which I would want to go to work everyday, instead of dreading it as I do now. Back when I was fresh out of high school, I didn't appreciate what college could do for me.  I just wanted to take the easy way out and start working and making money, but the real world ends up kicking your butt.

I feel like I spend a lot of time thinking (and worrying) about my future.  Am I the only who does this? In what ways do you cope with the pressures of life, and school, and prepare yourself for what the future has to hold?  I am interested to hear your ideas and opinions, so leave a comment below.