Same Answer (#18)

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17 Jun 20114 comments
This is a personal entry for my 30-day Trusting Myself challenge, part of Seth Godin's #Trust30 project, inspired by Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Today's Challenge:

Write down your top three dreams. Now write down what's holding you back from them.

Today's entry:

So, here's my dilemma. I feel like I should be giving different, brilliantly unique answers to each of these questions. If you ask me what my goal is 5 different ways, though, and I give you 5 different answers, then I don't really have any idea what my goal is, do I?

Here are 3 big dreams/goals that I've mentioned in other #Trust30 posts:

  1. See the Earth from space – Day 5
  2. Learn Mandarin Chinese – Day 15
  3. Re-commit to my workout – Day 7

I suppose that #1 is really a Capital-D dream – the others are more of a path to a dream and to my own self-actualization. I should also add that these are entirely personal development goals, not family, work, or material goals. I can't chart the course of my family, and the basics of raising my daughter well and taking care of her and my wife are always going to be a fundamental priority of my life.

What's holding me back? Well, #1 is pretty obvious – it's not feasible yet. So, I can just try to stay in shape and count my pennies. I've started practicing Mandarin after my work hours, when I'm spending time with my daughter, because it only requires listening (not my face glued to a screen). Exercise got thrown off by a cold, but I'm working on doing my basic workout before I turn on the computer in the morning. That's a big stumbling block for me, practically.

No real excuses, in other words. I need to keep doing what I'm doing. I'm working hard to stay focused on a couple of big priorities (like #2 and #3) and not spread myself too thin. One of the dangers of these introspective periods is going plan crazy and trying to take on the world in a week. That makes for a great week followed by 3 months of failure. I'd rather have steady success, even if it isn't as sexy.

17 Jun – Julie Jordan Scott

I enjoyed reading your words (plus I responded on twitter, too...) I have been working to deepen my responses on trust30 so much that I often write one blog post and then by the end of the day, have discovered more and will write an addendum.

I wrote the other day about Heraclitus and his experiences (and mine) of "You never step in the same river twice." We are different from one moment to the next as is the river.

There are photos on my blog to illustrate.

(And finally, who describes sexy as a fast burn? Sure, that's fun sometimes but give me a steady pace of daily, intentional, focused experimentation and wow.. each burn gets better... microwave sex? No thank you. I would rather have a slow cooker any day. LOL).

17 Jun – Dr. Pete

@Julie - Admittedly, my Tweet was a bit more biting than my actual take on today's prompt. I've been trying, since I chose to accept this challenge, to find value in each day's question. I just found that today was so simple and reminiscent of recent prompts that it didn't leave much room for variety.

Part of my goal is to make tougher choices and more fully commit to a small number of dreams, instead of trying to do everything and letting 95% of it slip. So, I wanted to be careful not to run off on 3 all new dreams today. I sometimes get too wrapped up in the excitement of new plans and forget the satisfaction of realizing those plans, even if that's a much longer journey.

As for sexy, duly noted :)

17 Jun – Julie Jordan Scott

LOL. I was afraid I went to far with the latter commentary. I am grateful I didn't offend and yes, my blog posts are less voluminous than either my thoughts or my actions (thankfully for my blog visitors!)

I look forward to reading more of your posts. Best wishes!

19 Jul –

Couldn't be written any better. Reading this post reminds me of my old room mate! He normally kept talking about this. I will forward this write-up to him. Pretty sure he will have a fantastic read. Thanks for sharing!