I use the word DREAM a lot in my writing and in my coaching conversations and sometimes wonder if it is correctly understood.  Dreams and Dreamers have often gotten a bad rap. I once knew a man whom several people described as a dreamer who would never amount to much, and of course Kenny Rogers made a huge hit out of a song entitled “Don’t Fall in Love with a Dreamer” that includes the line, “he’ll break you every time.”  So here you are, an intelligent, smart and ambitious person telling your friends and family that you are going to follow your dream.  If you are like the rest of us, they will tell you that you are nuts, silly or just plain crazy! I want to help you challenge that mindset right now. Valerie Young has written an article called Jumpstart Your Life by Dreaming Big in which she says the following: Wishing is passive. We wish for things over which we are powerless. We wish we’d win the lottery, that we were taller, that the waiter would hurry up. Dreaming is different.  Dreams are active.  They invite possibilities. You can see a dream.  That why Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. didn’t say, “I have a wish”. Dr. King knew that dreams are visual, positive, and contagious!

A dream has substance and meaning. A dream can be shaped and grown.  Indeed, a dream can become reality. Dreaming is active.  Giving a dream its life takes planning, learning and work.  Wishers are unable to take action; dreamers are creative and proactive. So take a long look at your dream, and then start laying the groundwork to make it come alive.