Dreamers and Doers

What am I doing these years? For many years I have been a proud dreamer. I could get lost in the clouds for hours, dreaming of travelling to faraway countries and enjoying different cultures there. My dream career: a best-selling author, changing people's hearts with my words, or a reporter, serving the people and giving voice to those who have not been heard for centuries.

I spend most of my time dreaming. What's the problem with spending so much time dancing among sunset-painted cotton candy clouds? Well, the problem is that my bare feet seldom kiss the earth, and by being lost in my dreams often, I become absent from my own real life and out of touch with the people I love.

"Stop dreaming. Be a doer not a dreamer," a famous television producer described in her speech. "You just have to keep doing something, catching the next chance, staying open to try something new. It doesn't have to satisfy your imagination of the perfect job or the perfect life. Perfect is boring and dreams are not real. Just ... DO."

One of the hardest lessons a dreamer has to learn is that in order to cultivate the type of life we fictionalize so often, we must match our dreams with action. Otherwise, as the producer puts it, "Dreamers often end up living in the basement of relatives."

Another hard truth that we dreamers must know is that by being lost in dreaming, we overlook ourselves. We usually dream of becoming someone else. We dream about the people who are not us, and this is a problem because it means we would rather be others instead of ourselves.

So, this is me waving goodbye to my cotton candy clouds. I am challenging myself to meet my dreams with action. It won't be easy. Those light and soft clouds have been a great source of comfort through the endless thunderstorms that have disrupted my life. It's comfortable.

However, as my best friend often reminds me, good things don't always bring comfort. The best thing for us is challenging. It is a lot more meaningful than those cotton candy clouds.