Dreams bigger than ourselves

Over the course of your life, have you often thought of doing something BIG, something SO impactful; even if just for one person?

Storytime

In the Spring, I had the honor of meeting a lovely woman and two of her four children. She noticed Bianca and asked if she could pet her. We started talking and she told me of her family which included four adopted children and four rescued dogs. In telling her that Bianca was now deaf, she mentioned that the son who was with her was also deaf. This gave me the opportunity to use the little bit of sign language I know and have practiced over the years.

This interaction stirred something in me. Throughout my adult life, I often find myself thinking, “How can I be a light in this world?”. Various answers have come up… start a foster care home, train Bianca to be a therapy dog, rescue and train horses. The list goes on and on.

Every so often, I will have short bursts of encouragement in this area, whether it be through interactions such as the one I described above; or through big things such as the Purpose to Impact program through Harvard. One of the things that came out of these momentary, “bigger than life” moments was of course, this blog. Now that I am nearing 1.5 years of writing the blog, I realize it just isn’t big enough. I want to make more of an impact and on a daily basis.

Encouraging moments

At this point in time, my mind is thinking through all the things I could do. And as I’ve been letting my brain chew on this topic, I’ve come to realize how often I have these encouraging moments. But also how often I let the thought drift back out of my mind. Subconsciously, thinking I’ll never be able to make that big of an impact.

Isn’t it interesting how this happens. However, when I look around, and look toward my role models, I realize, each of us CAN make a difference, even if to one person. And, most likely, those of us that have these bigger than life dreams DO make a difference on a regular basis. Potentially, just by being who we are and interacting with those around us.

Bigger than ourselves

Yes, yes I realize that those of you who have read this far, are thinking something similar to my exact thought. Something like: “But Rose… I want to make a really BIG difference. I don’t want to just influence the immediate people around me, but I want to really be impactful to a LARGE group of people.”  This type of dream might seem unattainable.  It may seem that you aren’t enough.  It may seem that these types of things are so much bigger than ourselves that no amount of money, or time could let us accomplish it. 

These types of thoughts are what allows us to let these dreams drift away from us, and go back to our daily life without taking steps toward them.  However, I am here to say, not just to you dear reader, but to myself as well; that in fact, we CAN accomplish these big dreams.  With small steps forward, and networking with others, any big change can be made.  It starts with the way we show up daily, and grows with the little interactions, until the snowball affect takes place and before we know it… we’ve started the foster care program, or the arts and music program; or we’ve planted the 100 trees.  

And with this… I encourage you to rekindle the dream in your heart.  Let this be the fan to the flame to allow your mind to chew on your ideas and your big dreams!  Continue to be the best person you can be in the moment; and keep making small progress in the direction of impactful, BIGGER than life type movements.

Connect

For now, I’d love to know, what is your ‘bigger than life’ dream? What area of life would you like to be a part of making better? Is there a group of people you have in mind to impact on a regular basis? Are there dreams on your heart which you could take a small action today towards? And, lastly, please give your self credit of the steps you’ve already taken toward these dreams. Remember, you are significant; your presence, resources and even your smile can be the start to a wave of positive influence.

So, here I will leave you. Until all of us have are big dream defined, we can keep moving in the direction of small actions; and showing up as ourselves, knowing eventually the larger and bigger than life dreams will come about.