Dreams and Fantasies

There are dreamers and there are those who fantasize and then there are others with hearts full of dreams that will never be let out because they are afraid of “what others might think”. They are afraid of being different but, that is what our dreams are for! Dreams and fantasies are the tools in our hearts that make us different. That’s what makes each of us an individual. That’s what keeps us from being a rubber stamp of everyone else! My definition of a dreamer is; one who thinks of something different and then says to themselves “I know I can figure out a way to make it happen.” The one who fantasizes, dreams the same dream and then says to themselves “I wish someone would figure a way to do that”, never realizing that they had the power to do just that. To me, my dreams are the spark that ignites the flame of making things happen. My goal has always been to find a way to make IT happen. Looking back I can’t remember ever saying “I give up” there always has to be a way. In my heart I have always felt that if I can dream it, I can find a way to make it happen! No one ever told me that making a dream happen would ever be easy. God has given most dreamers the ability to visualize their dreams. Some might call this daydreaming. I call it one of God’s gifts! We must thank the dreamers for getting us out of the dark ages. Many of those who fantasize write excellent novels. They have the ability to dream things the way they wish they were and then have the ability to put those dreams into words. They have the ability to place their dreams in a world of make believe. I guess you could say that those of us who dream use more logic in our dreams. To me the most gifted of the dreamers are those who have the ability to both dream and fantasize they are able to dream into the future. They are the ones that dream “the impossible dream” and then make it happen. They are the ones that use the stepping stones of today to walk us into the unforeseen future of tomorrow. God filled each of our hearts with dreams. The more of our dreams we bring forth and fulfill the easier we’ll find it to open our hearts for our next one. If we hide our dreams and share them with no one, we are robbing ourselves of the creative part of our heart. Sooner or later that heart will wither and fade away leaving only the shell that held all of our dreams, hopes, promises, and joys of our youth. The poorest people on earth are those unwilling to open their hearts to let their dreams flow from those hearts. Also, high on my don’t like list, are those that try to make others dream “their way”. Each person’s dreams and fantasies are different, even for identical twins. Our dreams are similar to our finger prints in that no two are the same. That’s what makes each an individual. Today’s schools are the place to learn of the dreams and accomplishments of others. The teachers are there to ignite that spark that opens hearts and minds of inquisitive young people. We cannot afford to let the unruly and undisciplined control those classrooms. Our dropout rate is way too high. We must find a better way to encourage those young dreamers. Those who WANT to learn. Those who know in their hearts that they can find the dreams “to make it better”! Without our dreams and fantasies we all would be no more than the walking dead and sad to say I don’t have to look far to see more and more of this in today’s society. It’s our duty to encourage our kids to dream THEIR dreams but we must not try to change those individual dreams God put in each of their hearts. Many of our greatest inventers had the ability to take the completed dreams of others and then improve on them. Today this is known as progress. It seems that God puts some of the greatest dreams in the hearts of the least of us. Great dreams are not restricted to race, creed, color or the amount of money in your bank account, each time you dream just thank your God for the blessing. This one is for Sam.

My World

I’m back, with a few more scars, but I now have it back under control! The me I like better is back in control! All, or maybe I should say most of, the negatives that unloaded on me are back in their place. Was it a learning experience? You bet it was! Now back to my subject; my world, or maybe I should say the world my God and I put to gather for me is, I can’t really say it’s a wonderful world, but it is not that bad a place to live in. I still find myself continually looking for those good things to walk through the door of my life. I now know that I have to be a little more selective when that door is open, I have learned that an open door is also an invitation for all of the bad things standing around just waiting to sneak in. Long ago I learned that those negative things made me feel sad and unimportant and all the positive things helped me feel good. That was the time in my life that I became over confident and a bit selfish. I’m sure we’ve all said it; it can’t happen to me. I started believing all those positive things were put in my world “just for me!” As I started seeing all of those “just for me” things I forgot that my world also had a lot of bad things floating around. I had learned that many times others would blindly walk past blessings that I knew were put there just for me to see. I would have never believed that bad stuff could also have been put there “just for me to see!” As I talked to others, I found myself amazed by how many were only finding negatives in their lives! I found many that, in their quest for ugly, they were trampling over the unseen beauty and blessing put before them, never realizing the beauty of those things before their presence! I learned that beauty only remains beauty until someone brings ugly into the picture. I learned that many times beauty is surrounded by ugly. I’m reminded of a lighthouse that I was photographing on an island off of Washington State. Everything was “just right!” The light was great, the sky was blue, an old schooner was just off shore, but I wanted to get that “just right” angle. As I concentrated on my subject I walked out into a briar patch. The instant before I pushed the shutter button both of my feet slipped under a vine and I fell face down in that field of thorns! As I put my hands down to push myself up, there was nothing under my hands but thorns! I had to lay there until help arrived! I got my picture, but by that time nothing was the same! Sometimes we have to endure a little pain to find that beauty! It brought back the memory of a childhood friend that always warned me “Bob you got to remember, it ain’t always gonna be easy!” The world of my youth, always found me wondering what was over the next hill or around the next turn. Of my mid life, it was, one beautiful place after another, often looking for that special sunrise or sunset. My today’s world is limited to a few hours work, then several hours spent looking out my front window, while relaxing in the comfortably nest I’ve created for myself. It’s a great world! I now have the time to watch plants and animals grow. I have time to do things that I was always too busy to do before! Yes, Bob’s head is again back on straight!!!

Truth Or Storytelling

A few days ago, the award winning movie director, Oliver Stone made a statement that really made me start to think. He said, “We don’t know what the dialog really was, so we fill in the blanks the way we think it should have been!” I’ve been told that my God sometimes speaks the same words to several, but each finds a different meaning in those same words. I believe words are given to us as starting points, and then we are to digest those words in our hearts and then use them as each heart sees them. Something that has surprised me is; how often I can go back and reread my older essays and find new meaning in them, an entirely different meaning than I originally planned. Throughout our world, we still can find tribes that have no written history. Their history is passed down by “Storytellers.” I have never heard them referred to as historians. Could it be that history always looks better with a little embellishment? In all wars, all religions, in life in general there is always two rights and two wrongs. It always depends upon which side you are on! Even your belief! Could it be that quite often we have to bend reality to make it sound right? One time, when talking about life, Steve Jobs said “Sometimes we don’t know how to push the right key.” I might add, sometimes we can’t find that “right key!” Sometimes we must rethink the margins of our pages so that we leave room for our side notes. Often we find those side notes to be the most important part of our writing! That is the place we rethink all we have written. I look upon all religions as storytelling. Even though, most will tell you that they believe their “Holy Book” to be the word of God. I can’t remember ever being told that they know it to be God’s word! We must remember most have been translated from hearsay. And we all know that man has a history of controlling facts to fit his beliefs, of filling in the blanks. The way he thought it should have been done! And, most of us want to fill in those blanks our way! The more thought I give to my deciding what is truth and what is storytelling is something like a juggling act. Truth is what each of us feels in our own heart. Storytelling is what most of us has learned to accept as truth. Each of us must decide what is right for us.