Dreaming With Action

Today is my High School graduation, I never thought that I'd be celebrating this day. I was always homeschooled so I never looked forward to this day or spent time imagining what it would look like. Now that it's here, I'm realizing something about my personality. I’ve always known that I'm a dreamer - it's even a huge part of my personality type which is INFP. The fact that I haven't dreamt about this day means a lot because I'm always dreaming. I dream about the days coming and what they will look like, what will be said, and what will happen. How will I feel on such and such day? Who will I speak to when the time comes? These are all things I think about, but again, I never dreamed about my graduation day and I'm shocked to admit that to myself.

There's multiple ways to dream. Sometimes it can even be dangerous. If you dream with full expectations, you can deceive yourself into believing you're entitled to getting those results. If you dream with jealousness, you will become cold-hearted and your thankfulness will decrease. These are lessons we’ve all had to learn the hard way and we can all relate to these feelings.

But how often do we dream the present into existence? How often to we watch our surroundings and go, “Hmm. Wouldn’t it be cool if someone did this? Or what if this happened right now? What can I do to make this look different?” We need to start dreaming with action. We need to make “dreaming” a physical verb, not just something that happens inside. You can dream in the past but it's much more satisfying to dream in the present.

I think sometimes young people make the mistake of dreaming in the past, especially once they leave high school. Typically, a high school student, once they graduate, thinks what now? So of course college is always the default response and choice of action.

College trains you to dream in the past, it doesn't push you to move forward. It moves you sideways. Dreaming is a skill, it's hard, it's creative. And when I say creative, I mean it takes heart and sweat. It requires something more of you - it's both mental and physical.

I want to encourage the rest the 2018 graduates to dream with action. Learn, grow, experiment. You can do so much with your talents, dream hard.