This month i am participating in the A-Z Blogging Challenge.
i thought i'd have trouble finding the time to blog every day, save Sunday, for this challenge, but what i'm struggling with more is coming up with what to write. What a surprising turn of events. Anyone who knows me even fairly well knows i love to talk, and am almost never at a loss of what to say.
For some reason, "D" did not come easily. Sure, i thought of plenty of D words, but words beginning with D do not alone make for a good, readable post.
But, there is one very important D word: Dreams. As cheesy or cliche as it may sound, dreams are so important. You have to have dreams. Without your dreams, how would you know what goals you want to work towards? There are plenty of people out there who'd just love to crush your dreams, mostly because they've given up on theirs ever coming true.
i still carry around dreams from years ago, dreams that appear as if they'll never come to fruition. Nothing in my life points to them being a possibility, even in the distant future, but i'll not let them go. Without our dreams, our world would be empty. Without dreams, we'd never have realized manned flight, or the Sistine Chapel's painted ceiling, or even the birth of a nation called America. i know, this sounds like a bad Hallmark card, but the thing is, it's true.
Don't ever let loose your dreams. Don't ever let someone kill your dreams, or tell you you're a fool for dreaming such ridiculous things. Dreams are the mind's playground, and can lead to some amazing, never before heard of discoveries. Without dreams, our days would feel empty, but with them, life is ripe and rich and full, and the fruit is there for the picking, if only you believe.
Remember when you were young and you felt the world was full of possibility? You hadn't yet been jaded or had your heart broken or saw what horrors people could inflict upon one another. Your entire life lay out before you, brimming with potential. There existed a certain feeling inside you, hard to describe, but it was there. You heard a favorite song or read a wonderful book and you could feel it. You could sense it in the change of seasons, smell it in the air when summer turned to autumn. It's a feeling that's hard to pin down with language, but i refer to it as magic. That's how it felt, as if there were magic all around me, inside me, and anything was possible.
i lived with this feeling up into my early 20's, and then one day i realized i had lost it. i struggled with depression for a long time, and wondered if the path i had chosen (or had chosen me) was the right one. i adore my family, but i worried all i would ever be was a wife, a mom, a housekeeper. Being a mom is a great joy in my life and something i cherish, but i feared i had put aside my own dreams to raise a family. i had aspirations to be a travel photographer, an archeologist, a writer. i didn't want to be famous (i don't like the spotlight on me), i just wanted to act on my passions and make them into a career. i wanted to see the world and discover different cultures, meet new people, take amazing photographs, write the stories that were in my head. i doubted that these dreams would ever come to fruition, and i felt trapped.
And then one day, i was working on a piece; i don't even remember what it was, but everything was flowing just right, i was in the zone and i felt giddy. And it hit me, here it is, here's the magic, it's back! It was there all along really, in my son's laugh, in the winter sunrise, in my true love's face when he smiled at me that certain way, in the first blossoms of spring...it was all around me, i just wasn't paying attention. But art helped me see it again, feel it again. Some days it's only a low hum underneath the daily obstacles in life - the bill paying, housework, grocery shopping - and other days it's a chorus. The quickest way to tap into it, for me, is through art. In art i can create my own playground, fulfill my own dreams, craft my own little bits of magic. It can be whatever i mold it to be, whatever i dream up. And it's always there, waiting for me to fulfill its potential. Art is part therapy for me; without it i would be lost.
i think we are all trying to reclaim the magic we felt as a child. We do a lot of what we do just to have that feeling again, to feel free and excited about what's to come, what lay ahead, to feel like anything is possible and all our dreams will come true. So today i urge you to tap into that magic - make art, or listen to a song you loved when you were young, or re-read a favorite book, or go outside and watch the clouds, or sit down with your child and fingerpaint, or take a leisurely drive down a road you've never been on. Because what is life without magic, without joy? Open yourself up to the magic and i promise you'll see the world in a whole new way. And if you already have, hold tight; don't let anyone or anything steal that feeling from you. Keep it going and spread it around. Because the world could use a lot more magic.
