“Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.” – Harriet Tubman
“Are you the dreamer of your dream?” This is one of my favorite questions when helping clients clarify what they really really want. Can you honestly say that the path you are on is one that is chosen by you? Many of us are following the path we are on because it is convenient, simple, safe, etc. We may be feeling like there is something bigger out there but just do not quite have the time, energy and/or courage to pursue it. If this describes you, a quick scan of what is holding you back may be in order!
What’s Holding You Back?
What holds us back from being the “dreamer of our dreams”? First and probably the most important thing that holds us back is the influence of and decisions we made during our formative years. We may have made choices about our future that are based upon what our parents, siblings, teachers and even childhood friends thought we were capable of. Later, our partners and other relationships came into play. Although it is important to include the perspectives of these relationships in dreams along with the changes that might impact them, it is definitely not a promising idea to give full power for our decisions.
A second thing that holds us back is our tapes about ourselves which could also come from our formative years but also can develop from recent interactions with others, the media, and just beliefs that we have learned along the way. I call these messages “tapes” because they are on a continual loop in our mind. They include phrases such as: I cannot; I am not; you are not; you do not; etc. If you want to know what tapes are running through your mind, spend several moments each day in reflection. I promise you they will surface.
Are you Stuck?
Resilience researchers suggest that we can get stuck believing that our environments and adverse events determine our future when in reality it is our reaction to those environments and events that determine our future. The interpretation along with the meaning we assign to the events can determine whether we experience positive movement forward or a life of desolation and feeling stuck. Where in your life are your beliefs creating the future that you want to live into and where are you diminishing the dreams you have?
A close companion to other people’s tapes running in our heads is the actual self-talk we engage in with ourselves. We constantly talk to ourselves, and our self-talk becomes our reality as we live into those thoughts and beliefs. We do not look for reasons that enable us to live into our dreams instead we find examples and experiences that prove our dreams cannot become reality. Negative self-talk is extremely dangerous as the more frequently we engage in it, the more entrenched and reinforced our beliefs become. In fact, the most recent research in neuroscience suggests that negative thoughts look for other negative thoughts to connect with in our brains which even more solidifies the negative message. A very scary proposition indeed.
Reflect on Your Self Talk Daily
A good exercise is to reflect on your self-talk daily and determine where you are continuing the negative tapes. As you analyze these tapes you can begin to rewrite them both mentally and physically and shape them into the dreams you desire. Wayne Dyer in When You Believe It, You Will See It challenges us to transform our limiting beliefs into opportunities through a willingness to see situations differently. Imagine that you are a coach and are talking to yourself. How would you support and challenge yourself to see what you perceive as your limitations differently? What evidence would you share that demonstrates the possibility of your dreams becoming reality? As long as we ignore the proof to believe differently about ourselves, we remain stuck in others’ beliefs as well as our own unsubstantiated beliefs about ourselves.
Complacency can also hold us back. We get comfortable with the way things are in our lives and moving beyond them or changing them feels like too much effort. Yes, it is sometimes difficult to energize ourselves when we are comfortable, but we are talking about your dreams right? Gay Hendricks in The Big Leap shares that people can have what he calls an “Upper Limit Problem” and this problem prevents them from truly moving from complacency into their dreams. He asks the reader to respond to four questions.
- First, am I willing to increase the amount of time that I feel good inside?
- Second, Am I willing to increase the amount of time that my whole life goes well.
- Third, am I willing to feel good and have my life go well all the time?
- And finally, are you willing to take the Big Leap to your ultimate level of success in love, money, and creative contribution?
Answering yes to these questions will begin the movement out of complacency and into your dreams.
Are You Ready to Turn A Dream into a Reality?
If you are ready to turn a dream into a reality by setting a goal and following through with that goal, join faculty member Carol Assalian’s research study which explores how we move through challenges when engaging in behavior change.
The link for the research project is kaskor.research@gmail.com. Please register by July 29. It might be just what you need to jumpstart a goal you set earlier in the year!