Dreams To Plan

"Dreams are free, so free your dreams." - Astrid Alauda

I have always been fascinated by dreams. Each of us have them and each of us know when one occurred either last night or the night before. But for the life of me, can you always remember everything that happened in your dream?

In a book called NIGHTLIGHT, written by The Lucidity Institute, they write that "the first dream of the night is the shortest, perhaps 10 minutes in length, while after 8 hours of sleep, dream periods can be 45 minutes to an hour long. We all dream every night, about one dream period every 90 minutes. People who say they never dream simply never remember their dreams. You may have more than one dream during a REM (dream) period, separated by short arousals that are most often forgotten. It is generally accepted among sleep researchers that dreams are not recalled unless the sleeper awakens directly from the dream, rather than after going on to other stages of sleep."

So I wake up after each dream in order to remember them?

No wonder I toss and turn at night.

Psychology Today reports more recently dreams have been viewed as mere "mental exercises of the brain with no function at all." Think of it as the mind's attempt to make sense of random neural firing while the body restores itself during sleep.


Maybe it is a lot of random, meaningless brain waves firing in nonsensical patterns. As powerful as the brain is, it tries to interpret or put these random firings into some sort of logical sequence. Similar to making sense of events during our waking hours but only while asleep.

Yet in those random firings we might find something new and daring.

During the light of day, we think and attempt to put various thoughts together. It works pretty well, but distractions and other sensory input can cloud our thinking and judgment.

But in the randomness of dreams, combinations and bits of information we may not find in the daylight can come together. We can find new possibility, new ways of doing what the old can not.

That is the great thing about dreams, they can give you new ideas.

- If your dreams show you living and running along the beach, you can set that as a goal and realize it.
- If you find in your dream an accident happening, maybe its an indication to drive more defensively.

I do not mean dreams are a crystal ball to future events.

What I do believe is dreams can be a way of seeing your life from a different perspective. You can use your dreams to find a new way of doing things, to think differently or to create a better you.

Now if I could only remember that dream from last night...

Stay inspired my friends!

Closer Than You Think

“Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird, that cannot fly." ― Langston Hughes

You are well through the year, many months removed from New Year resolutions.

Is hope for accomplishment still strong or fading from your mind?
Is the hope of achieving your dreams fresh and strong within your heart?

Keep hold of hope, keep your dream alive.

Overcome the obstacles and discouragement along your path.
Never give up, never stop trying.

Let the negative be a reason to succeed in spite of it.

Your attitude will determine what success or failure looks like.
Remain positive throughout the adventure.

Stay inspired my friends.

Raising a BAR

"Vision, it reaches beyond the thing that is, into the conception of what can be. Imagination gives you the picture. Vision gives you the impulse to make the picture your own." - Robert Collier

When you dream at night, there is nothing else to interfere with the imagination. In some instances, those dreams can be remembered during the waking hours. Once in a while they are remembered with full clarity and many other times only bits and pieces which tend to fade quickly.

Dreams are many time an imagined future or expectation of greater things.

Those dreams are an undefined mound of wet clay, waiting for you to form it. As you remember and begin to concentrate on those dreams remembering the details, your imagination mold the dream. This process will mold the clay into something only you can imagine.

The resulting form may change from what you first dreamt, but it will become clear for your life.

As the dream becomes more real, apply your awakened vision in order to move you towards realizing the dream as a tangible part of your life. It prods you to walk through an open door on a journey of movement; a journey of great things.

- Allow yourself to Believe in big dreams.
- Allow yourself to Act with a vision towards it.
- Allow yourself to Realize a great life achieved.

Go beyond the current and forward towards a future that has so much opportunity. A large life is out there waiting for you.

Stay inspired my friends!

Follow Your Shadow

"Instead of watching the bird as it flies above our heads, we chase his shadow along the ground; and, finding we cannot grasp it, we conclude it to be nothing." - Augustus William Hare

Each morning, we arise from slumber of night where our dreams have been allowed to run freely. The endless movie in our mind in which we have a vision of something for our life. It is so real in dreams that we can almost touch them.

Yet we wake from them with the rising sun, only to let them float away like a child's balloon. Our waking hours cause us to concentrate on work and the everyday task of living. The waking hours also push our dreams into a quiet corner of the mind.

We may have passing thoughts of them such as the shadow of a bird flying overhead. We see the dream, but when we look up it has passed and is no where to be found. So we decide the dream did not exist. Did the dream really ever happen?

In slumber it seems so real. It is in slumber that we allow ourselves to believe the dream or vision can occur. Only in waking hours do we push it off as a shadow of something that doesn't exist.

Those dreams and visions can become real in your life if you allow yourself to believe in them. They are not passing shadows of nothing. They can be pursued and found just as the shadow has a real existence to it. The shadow is of a soaring bird reaching higher levels.

Believe your dreams can come true and find yourself soaring to higher levels. Stay inspired my friends.

Planting Now for a Later Harvest

"It is only the farmer who faithfully plants seeds in the Spring, who reaps a harvest in the Autumn." ~ B. C. Forbes

The fall will arrive quickly and we will wonder how the year went by so quickly away from us? It will seem like only yesterday that we were celebrating the new year, full of hope and wonder? Will we have wasted our days daydreaming or will we have prepared those dreams and planted them in the spring?

When September takes hold of our days, the harvest will be upon us.

Those seeds of hope and want were planted in great soil in the spring of the year. Will we have carefully watered and tended to them into the summer months, knowing our expectation of a bountiful harvest? And when fall arrives, will we reap the reward of our hard work?

When we harvest that bounty, will we store those collected achievements to carry us through the winter months. For it is the harvest that gives us yearning and desire for new dreams when another new year approaches.

Are you acting upon your dreams and planting them with actions?

Will you tend to them and move boldly to ensure your dreams take root and flourish? If not, you will wonder where the time went when harvest arrives and there is nothing for you to reap. Or you may wonder why your harvest is so small. For the time was wasted and a cold winter will approach and want will take over your days.

We are now in the time of planting and tending to our dreams.

The actions you take now, throughout the summer and into the fall will prove to be worthy. Spring time is the time to begin movement. Start now, preparing, moving, and bringing your dreams to life. Spring is a great time to plant seeds and the time to take action upon your dreams is now. The great harvest this fall will be the reward for all of your hard work.

Stay inspired my friends.

Pushing an Elephant

“We can easily manage if we will only take, each day, the burden appointed to it. But the load will be too heavy for us if we carry yesterday's burden over again today, and then add the burden of the morrow before we are required to bear it.” -John Newton

The band R.E.M. released a song back in 1999 titled The Great Beyond. In it there was a line which went, "I'm pushing an elephant up the stairs, I'm tossing out punch lines that where never there". According to lead singer Michael Stipe, the song is "about attempting the impossible..."

Each day you get up, you have an opportunity to try the impossible. Each of us have different levels of achievement and it isn't about your 'impossibility' being any harder then my 'impossibility'. It is about what you believe you can do in your own life. To seek the impossible and achieve it. Know that we are not in a contest to see who had to work harder or who has the "larger elephant to push up the stairs." It is about you believing in your own abilities to push the largest elephant you can up those stairs. To achieve the greatest when others say it is impossible.

Focus on the impossible, be the visionary of your own life. Know that if you let go of yesterday, focus on today and be patient with what is coming tomorrow, you will have better success in accomplishing your dreams.

Stay inspired my friends.

Your Imagination

"Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire; you will what you imagine; and at last you create what you will." -George Bernard Shaw

Your imagination is endless and until you walk through a door towards it, you will never realize the possibility. Go forward in life dreaming big dreams and always moving towards those dreams. To stand still and do nothing means we may as well never imagine greater things for our life.

Turn your imagination into dreams...turn your dreams into goals...turn your goals into reality. Believe in your vision, act upon your vision and realize your vision.

The adventure will be a great one.

Stay inspired my friends.

Believe

""Never look back unless you are planning on going that way."." -Henry David Thoreau

I would imagine you are like most every other human on this planet. You have dreams of being more successful, or earning more money. You have dreams of greatness for your children or renewed health when pain fills every move you make. There are those that hope for love or friendship and those that want for a better life. All of us dream of things during our life time.

The problem can be with the belief we have in that dream. How strongly do you believe in what it is you want for your life? How large is the faith in what is to come versus what has happened? There are many people that want, dream, yearn for all of these things in life. But their belief is more centered on the past as opposed to their future.

A woman may want for a relationship that is filled with love and comfort, but she dwells on past relationships. When she gets close to a man, her belief in something good is outweighed by belief in what has happened previously. The negative things that have happened in her life win out every time with belief in the past.

A man looks to advance in his job, a new promotion and responsibility. He becomes a candidate for a new position but it will require interviews and rising above the competition. Yet if he chooses to believe in his past experience, he condemns his future. He will be his own worst competition to moving forward in life.

All of us tend to give way too much credit for our past mistakes or stumblings. We have life's experience behind us, but life moves forward from where you are today. Life forward from the past, not towards it; it is today that counts. Where you stand, the person that you are right now, this very moment is where you begin.

The past is the past and you need to let it go. You need to reverse your thinking to a forward looking direction. Stop believing in what has gone wrong and believe in what will happen moving forward. Believe in the impossible and make it real.

Start living your life with forward momentum, believing in your future and leaving behind what has gone wrong in the past. What the past says is impossible, tomorrow says it is possible. Tomorrow brings fresh hope, fresh opportunity and fresh belief in that possibility.

Stay inspired my friends and we'll talk again soon.

Getting Back Up

Jack and Jill by Jessie Willcox Smith

"Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

The American songwriter/singer, Ben Harper said, “If I fall, I fall. I'll rise up like anybody else.” Each of us is going to have those times when life has knocked us down to the ground. The hill we were climbing causes us to slip and tumble back to the bottom. Think of the old children’s nursery rhyme, “Jack and Jill went up the hill, to fetch a pail of water. Jack fell down and broke his crown, and Jill came tumbling after.”

The rhyme says that Jack got up and ran home. But my version says, “Jack got up, and dusted off, determined to go on. Back up the hill, along with Jill, to catch the rising sun.” A way of saying, “keep pursuing your dreams.” The only thing that can keep you from pushing forward is YOU. When YOU fall, it is YOU that determines if YOU will get back up.

Your Own Understanding of who YOU are will make the decision of getting back up either easy or hard. By having a positive attitude, it is more likely that you will bounce back up and try again. If you are a negative person, chances are you will stay stretched out on the ground.

All of this isn’t to say that there no difficult challenges to face. I have been through some of those challenges. The process of getting back up and battling through those challenges is not an easy task. But overcoming the challenges was an even greater reward.

Your life will be greater and you will get to see the sunrise in the morning, (aka, your dreams fulfilled). So get up and start heading back up that hill. There is water to fetch, seeds to plant and dreams to harvest.

Wondrous Stories

"Keep your dreams alive. Understand to achieve anything requires faith and belief in yourself, vision, hard work, determination, and dedication. Remember all things are possible for those who believe." ~Gail Devers

Recently I was listening to the song Wondrous Stories, by a group from back in the 1970s named YES. This particular group was and remains a favorite of mine. It reminded me of visiting my hometown with my father. As we drove, he told me stories of life growing up.

These stories are truly wondrous and I love to hear these wonderous stories not only from him, but from others about life. So much can be learned from listening and hearing of those things which make up who we are today.

It is these same stories we will pass down to others. There will also be stories that we have to pass down to others. All of these are wonderous and special. Each of them are worth gold to our lives if all we do is hear them. If you take the lessons learned, they will mold your dreams.



Yearn to hear the wondrous stories that those in your life have to tell.

Running Dream

Our life is filled with pursuits of dreams or visions of things that we want or want to accomplish. We turn those pursuits into reality when we turn the dream or vision into goals. The goal being something defined and real that we can measure.

We then head out in haste, racing towards achieving the goal. We move fast and then seem to run out of energy or ambition. We find ourselves running at the pace of a 5K race when in fact the race is a marathon. With nearly 42 kilometers to run, we find self-doubt in completing the goal.

It is in those defining moments, here at the building near the crossroads that you can choose to quit. You will leave your tattered dreams tacked to the walls of the room inside along with others long forgotten. Dreams that will always remain dreams.

But in that defining moment you can also decide to step through the door of choice and continue the race. You will make adjustment along the way, adjusting the pace of your pursuit. The building of lost dreams will be left far behind and as you near your goal, that building will have completely disappeared along with its disappointments.
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Follow Dreams

“Don't be pushed by your problems. Be led by your dreams.” -Unknown

Allow yourself to examine and follow your dreams. There will be days of discouragement but always look to your dreams which will guide you further.

Build Towards Your Dreams

Building a bridge to your dreams, building a bridge to a greater life; this bridge you are building will be one that takes you to a higher place. The Brooklyn Bridge was a dream of John Roebling in which he encountered many obstacles to getting built. But the dream was fulfilled and there have been millions of people whom have benefited from that dream.

Your own efforts to seek out your vision or dream will be filled with the naysayers and obstacles to success. But persevere and you will succeed. Build a bridge to your future.

The Bridge To Your Dream

“This bridge will only take you halfway there, to those mysterious lands you long to see. Through gypsy camps and swirling Arab fair, and moonlit woods where unicorns run free. So come and walk awhile with me and share the twisting trails and wonderous worlds Ive known. But this bridge will only take you halfway there. The last few steps you have to take alone.” -Shel Silverstein

Begin To Make It Happen

“You can't just sit there and wait for people to give you that golden dream. You've got to get out there and make it happen for yourself.” -Diana Ross

Begin The Reality Of Your Dreams

Then indecision brings its own delays,
And days are lost lamenting o'er lost days.
Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute;
What you can do, or dream you can, begin it;
Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.

- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Preparing For The New Year

As you prepare yourself for the Christmas Holiday or even as you approach the new year, it is a good time to evaluate your life. I like to say that 'now' is the best time when you are making a decision to make change. But there are many people that use a calendar event such as the first of January.

So what are the things you should be thinking and preparing for? Here are three questions to ask yourself.

1. Where are you?

- Examine yourself, are you happy, do you have strengths and weaknesses, is your life the type of life you want it to be? You need to understand where you are and who you are to better equip yourself to succeed.

2. What do you see around you?

- Meaning what do you see for you, do you have a vision for your life, a goal or dreams. Why go anywhere unless you have a destination in mind. The same goes for success in your life. Unless you have a goal in mind, the journey has little direction.

3. What do you want?

- You have established a goal, a set of dreams and visions of what you want your life to be. So do you really want it? Do you wish to simply sit still and only dream and plan, never moving closer to realizing it? You have to be bold now and move towards that dream. One step, small or large it all begins with being bold enough to start it.

Your new year will bring many changes if only you take that first step. Be bold, I know you can do it because all of us have it in us. Goals and dreams are powerful motivators, let them drive you to a great life.