How to Follow Your Dreams

The pathway to your dreams consists of three steps:

(1) Decide what you want

Most people do not know what they really want. They desire one thing today, and another thing the next day. To achieve your dreams you must first know exactly what they are.
Then you must have a strong reason for wanting them. This strong reason will act as your driving force, especially through trying times.
Note that we're talking here about following your own dreams, not someone else's, not following the crowd, but doing what genuinely makes you happy.

(2) Determine what it takes to get what you want

Want to be a great singer? What will it take to become one?
Want to own a country home? What will it take to own one?
Want to get married? Where and how can you meet the person of your dreams? How can you become "marriageable" to him/her? What kind of person must you be, to attract the kind of person you want?
You've got to find out what it will cost you to get what you want.
Make a detailed, written, step-by-step plan, with deadlines, that will lead you to your destination.
If you don't know what it'll take, don't be discouraged. Find out, do some research.
Your dream is worth all the effort. If it makes you happy, it's worth it.

(3) Do what it takes. Pay the price!

Now you have no excuses! Your written plan is your road map.
As Nike says, "Just do it!"
Everything good has a price, including your dreams.
You must now concentrate your efforts on those things that will take you towards your dreams, not away from them.
Take a step on your road map every day.
Keep yourself motivated, with the support of friends and family, a mentor, inspirational readings, whatever will keep you pressing on.
Stay away from dream thieves. Don't give in to procrastination.
And if you fall off track, don't condemn yourself, or let anyone else, just get back on again.
True strength does not lie in never having fallen, but in getting back up, each time you fall.


Here are some thoughts on following your dreams that have kept me motivated:

"There is no scarcity of opportunity to live your dreams; there's only a scarcity of resolve to make it happen."
-Wayne Dyer

"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams."
-Eleanor Roosevelt

"Obstacles can't stop you. Problems can't stop you. Only you can stop you."
-Jeffrey Gitomer

"All our dreams come true, if we have the courage to pursue them."
-Walt Disney

"Most people who claim they couldn't reach their goals (dreams) are people who, in truth, weren't willing to do whatever it took to do it."
-Les Brown

"The only thing that stands between a man and what he wants from life is often merely the will to try it and the faith to believe that it is possible."
-Richard M. DeVos


You can have whatever you want in life, as long as you're willing to pay the price.
Believe in yourself and your dreams.
Remember, God put them inside you.
Consider me as His messenger today, reminding you that all God's dream seeds have His spark of life in them.
All you need to do is plant the seed, and the DreamGiver will hold your hand from there.

Copyright 2005 Oma Edoja

The Courage To Be You!

"To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you into something else is the greatest accomplishment.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Who are you right now?

Are you who you want to be, or who circumstances have made you?

Just ask yourself a few questions and find out:

Do I really love my job, or am I doing it for the money/because I couldn't find anything else?

Do I really want to marry this man/woman, or am I doing so because "time is running out?"

Am I dating the boss because he threatened to fire me if I didn't?

Am I telling lies because "everyone else does?"

Am I giving in to peer pressure/trying to "keep up with the Joneses"?

Am I in debt through trying to impress others?

Is there anything I am doing right now that I would rather not, but I do it because I feel that I have to?

In answering these questions, you might realize that you are one person on the inside (the one you really want to be), but another person on the outside (the one you dislike, but think you have to be).

In other words, you are not you!

And you definitely don't feel good about it.

Some people try to make the most of this conflicting state of affairs, even putting up the appearance of enjoying what they do.

Others have denied their true selves for so long that they think they have become something else.

But the truth is, you can never be truly happy until you become "the real you", until you live true to your real self.

This is the reason that so many people seem to have everything, appear successful, but are inwardly unhappy.

These are the ones who are doctors/lawyers/bankers but would really rather be artists/housewives/enterpreneurs.

Are you unhappy with who you have become?

Take heart, there is hope!


Identifying the real you

What are the things that truly matter to you?

What do you consider the ingredients to a happy life?

If you could change your life, what would you change? What would you add/remove?

What character traits would you like to acquire/get rid of?


Take a pen and sheet of paper and write down the answers to these questions.

Your answers are a summary of your values.

These could include marital happiness, success, family, friendship, health, wealth, integrity etc.

Make a list of your values.

Next, re-write this list in order of priority i.e. your most important values at the top of the list, and the least important to you at the bottom.

Now, circle values 1-3.
These are your most important, or core values.

Your core values are what your life is about. They define who you truly are.
Any situation in your life that conflicts with your core values, or even any others, will make you unhappy.

For instance, some one who values family will be unhappy in a job that requires long hours and frequent travel.
A person for whom freedom and autonomy is important cannot be happy working for some one else.

Knowing your core values will enable you identify what you really want out of life.
And when you know this, you can pursue it.
In pursuing what really matters to you, and ignoring what doesn't, you become who you really want to be.
That is, you become the real you.


Being the real you

I know what it's like.

I used to be overweight, working at a job when I would much rather work for myself, leaving home at dawn and returning just before dusk, waking up to an alarm when I would rather wake up when I wanted, pursuing my employers' dreams when I would rather pursue my own, going to work instead of working my dreams..... the list could go on.

I need to state here that my core-values are God, family and excellence. I also value freedom/autonomy, and my health very highly.
My "previous existence" therefore conflicted totally with my true self.

Being overweight is far from excellent. And working long hours left no room for exercise, or even shopping for healthy food.

Working for others meant I had limited family time, and certainly not much freedom.
Also I am a practicing Christian and church worker. My job meant resigning from church work, reduced church attendance, and little or no personl prayer and Bible study.

How could I possibly have been happy?
I practically hated the way I lived.

A time came when I decided I couldn't take any more.
I was getting older, time was passing, and I hadn't accomplished any of my dreams.
I desperately hated being fat, fatigued and generally unhealthy.

While I would not recommend that you do the same, I resigned from my job and stayed home for a while trying to decide where I wanted my life to go.
I knew God had something for me to do, but this wasn't clear at the time.

To make it short, I took up exercising and eating healthily.
I lost the excess weight, got in shape and now feel great (excellence/health)!

I now work from home, my own hours, hence I'm up, writing at 1.21 am!( freedom/autonomy/family time)
I have always wanted to be a writer and motivational speaker, and that's what I do now.
I write articles for magazines, my website (www.goldenintimacy.com ,still under construction, should debut second week of February), and I have a motivational book in publication, with several manuscripts in hand).
I run motivational workshops and do motivational speaking (following my dreams).
And I usually take a break when my children are on holiday from school (family).

As for my Christian walk, I've returned to church work and I'm very exited about it (I'm a Children'sChurch teacher). I have a lovely prayer life, now having regular family devotions with my kids in the morning (we used to make do with a quick prayer as we dashed out of the house!).
I attend church regularly, with my family, and I often find time for "Bible breaks" during the day (my relationship with God).

It has never been easy following my dreams; I never expected that it would.
I have had to go without an income, as I launched my new career.
I have had friends and family harrowing about my "unorthodox" lifestyle (people who love freedom are usually quite unorthodox!)
Working out and healthy eating (not starving or dieting!) are not easy, but I love the results!
I don't have a salary "come looking for me" at the end of the month; I have to go looking for it!
And working at home means that everyone thinks you are available for a chat/visit/to mind their children/cook/do laundry etc!
It has taken a lot of courage, to give up the "known" for the " unknown".
But by and large, this is the life for me. I wouldn't have it any other way.
At last, I am really, unapologetically "Me!"
And it sure feels good!

The courage to be "You"

Most likely, your values are different from mine.
You might love being "cuddly and large", love working at your job, be single, or with grown up children. And you might not be particularly religious.
But you do have values of your own.
And I am happy for you if your life is centred around them.

However, to those of you who are living at a tangent to your values and dreams I say, would you like to become "the real you"?
Would you like to be truly happy with your life, knowing that it is the life you want, not what circumstances have made it?
Our lives will never be perfect on this side of eternity, but they can be fulfilling.
You can pursue your dreams, and reach them.
You can have the life you want.
As Walt Disney said, "All our dreams come true, if we have the courage to pursue them."

Courage is the ability to do something dangerous, risky, or to face pain or opposition, without showing fear.
Many times, following your dreams will be dangerous or risky.
You will face much pain when nothing seems to work, and no one believes in you.
And you will definitely have opposition.
Fear will breathe down your neck and stare you in the eye.
But if you know that fear is a toothless bulldog, making threats that it needs your permission to fulfill, you will learn to stare fear in the eyes, breathe down its neck, and chase it away.

The real fear is of what will happen if you don't take courage and take action.
Where will you be ten years from now?
What will you say at the end of your days - "Atlast", when you reach the end of your dreamlist, or "Alas", because you never even got started?

Take courage, and take stock of your life.
One step at a time.
I've been working four years to get where I am today.
It won't happen over night.
But it will happen, if you'll let it.
And the first step is to become the real you.

As Shakespeare's Hamlet said, "To thine own self be true."
Take courage, and be "You."

Copyright 2005 Oma Edoja

S.O.S.-Tsunami Victims

Hi!

Before you read my next post on the "How" of pursuing your dreams, please take some time out to think of the tsunami victims.

At present, all their dreams are shattered. All they can think of right now is survival, one minute at a time.
Imagine the children, suddenly without parents.
The pregnant women, wondering what kind of life awaits their unborn children.
The sick, without family to care for them.

You can sow a seed of love in their lives, a seed that will definitely fertilize the soil in which your dreams are planted.

How?
You can do this by rousing your community to collect a love offering for these brothers and sisters of ours, then sending it to your local UNICEF office, or the office of any international charity of your choice.
Your community could be your neighbourhood, your place of work, your school, church or social club.

Alone you may not be able to do much, but together you can do a lot.

Many times we empathise with those in need, but haven't a clue as to how we can help.

Now you know one thing you can do. Get to work on it right away.

You never know, some one's life just might be saved by the timely arrival of your contribution.

You can also dedicate a few minutes every day to pray for them.
Our prayers can do much more than we can. And distance is no barrier to prayer.

As you rethink and re-strategise with your life's dreams, remember those whose lives have been turned upside down and whose dreams have all been shattered.
And be thankful to God for what you do have.
Take a step to show Him how grateful you are by helping those who need you right now.

Till my next post, keep living your dreams and loving the tsunami victims.

Follow Your Dreams in 2005

We start out in life as dreamers.
Kids talk often about their dreams :

"When I grow up I'll be a.... "
"When I'm big I'll buy a... "
"I'm going to live in a... "

And adults think it's OK for kids to dream. After all, they "don't know any better", and it keeps them busy, out of our hair!

But as we grow older, we let people, circumstances, "reality", self-limiting beliefs rob us of those dreams.

We settle for much less, and spend the rest of our days pining for what might have been.

I'd like to tell you here that God put those dream-seeds in you as a child because He knew you didn't "know enough" back then to reject them.

You need to hold on to the dreams God gave you.
They are His gift to you, for a better life.

He has given you all you need to make them come true.
If only you'd stop looking in the wrong places!

You've got everything you need to get started, even if to you it looks like nothing!

Strangely, following your dreams, rather than giving in to the dream thieves, is the path to true satisfaction.

You'll never be happy doing anything else.

Why follow someone else's dreams when you can have your own?

I recently wrote that:

"Most people do not have the courage to follow their dreams.
They ask:

What will people say?
What if it doesn't work out?
How will I find the money?
Where will I find the time?

Most are defeated before they even start on their dreams.
They say:

I don't have the skills.
I don't have anyone to help me.
I can't do it.
I don't know anyone."

Excuses, excuses, excuses.
You've made them for so long that you now believe them!

Let this not be you in 2005.

Decree death to all your dream thieves (but please, not the people)!

Resolve to dig up your childhood dreams, see if you still want them, and GO FOR THEM if you do!

They're yours for the taking, believe me.

In my next post later this week, I'll talk about the "How" of following your dreams.

Meanwhile, ponder this:

You'll either live your life DRIVEN by your DREAMS,
or RUNNING from your NIGHTMARES.
-Omafuvwe Edoja

Copyright 2005 Oma Edoja