Can you imagine getting by in life doing as little as possible and being happy with it? Not only are some people living by ‘minimums are maximums’ they put themselves in an environment where their lack is normalized, sustained and even encouraged. Many people have been repelled from me because I push people to not forget their potential. Recently I have had a brief conversation with a close friend about her excessive sleeping habits. I explain that she can’t live by sleeping because sleep is not actual experience and there is no way to contribute to others while she is sleeping. I reiterated that she will not do the things she wants to unless she is awake and aiming towards achieving her goals. She said helplessly that she would never get to do the things she wants. Somehow she doesn’t believe in rewarded effort. I was a little surprised at her hopeless attitude. I didn’t think she would give up on herself. Most of her attitude stems from depression but I am not convinced she will renew her dreams after the depression passes.
I have often given an analogy of lost dreams. I use the example of how we think as kids and the things we own. As a kid I had all sorts of toys to play with and all sorts of posters on the wall. The things I had were completely similar to what most kids had. I had Star Wars, GI-Joe, posters of girls and cars. Kids have these things around their bedrooms because they believe these things are possible to obtain. In a boys case we believe we can have a girl that looks like the ones in the posters and own those cars. We even believe in flying through space killing the bad-guys. Somewhere between high school and college we are taught that we are foolish for playing with toys like that because that is not ever going to happen and we may as well throw those posters away because those things just don’t happen for most people. It isn’t any wonder most people don’t ever accomplish anything they want in life. We go through a system of learning that is against our natural ability to dream the dreams of children.