The Stuff of Dreams… (They’re the Beginning of Greatness)
Dreams…
They’ll always and forever be the starting point for greatness.
Prospero may have been referring to the fleeting and illusory nature of life when he said “We are such stuff as dreams are made on” but I like to interpret it to mean life is too short not to have big dreams and chase them.
A dream is the spark from which every bonfire of human achievement has ignited.
Everything else is there to help make it a reality.
No one’s wildest fantasies are of being average; they’re of being great. At a minimum, it’s at least accomplishing something we, as individuals, deem to be great. Maybe yours is starting a business (more on that in a second) or getting fit and healthy (near and dear to our hearts) or writing a book. It’s turning the dream into reality, no matter what it is, that takes it to the level of greatness.
It’s up to you to dream the dream but it’s going to take the power of your mind to make it come true.
We talk an awful lot about goals, systems and plans – and they’re critical – but it’s of paramount importance to understand each of them serves the dream and vision you have for your future.
We’re here to celebrate the power of your mind and the bigness of your dreams. They’re the seed from which everything springs. There’s a reason we say, “You can do anything you put your mind to.” It’s because your mind has the incredible power to direct you anywhere you choose to go.
Steve Jobs didn’t improve the flip phone by adding a really cool touch screen. He completely changed the way the phone is used and, in a way, how we live our daily lives. He transformed how we communicate with each other, listen to music, record and share memories and access and use the internet. Many of us don’t have a home phone anymore. Nowadays, the interwebs are surfed with a cell phone instead of a traditional desktop computer and an entire generation watches movies and TV on their smartphone instead of the idiot box my generation grew up in front of.
It’s an extreme example but the point is that he had a vision. He pursued it relentlessly – okay, he obsessed over it – and that’s what got it done. But it all started with a dream. All the goals, systems and plans were put in place in order to turn his vision into that life-changing device that’s never more than a foot away from us.
Goals, plans, strategies, tactics and systems without a big dream and a vision are nothing more than a road to nowhere.
Visions lead to strategies which lead to tactics. Notice which one is first and which is last. The dog has to wag the tail, not the other way around. Dodging traffic and wrenches, qualifying for and then winning the Las Vegas International Dodgeball Open Championships were the goals, plans, strategies and tactics Average Joe’s used to make their dream a reality. (No, the dream wasn’t winning the tournament.) It starts with something and that something has to be the one big thing you envision accomplishing.
Recognize the incredible power of your mind. It’s the most important thing you possess. Harnessing its awesome power – through positive thinking, grit, determination and an unrelenting pursuit of your dreams – is what separates the successful from those who aren’t.
The Super Bowl a couple of Sundays ago didn’t just mark the end of the season; it was the culmination of decades of dreaming and an overwhelming resolve to do whatever was necessary to make it come true. This year’s winners believed they were Super Bowl champions long before they actually proved it on the field. It drove them the entire way. To offseason workouts, training camp, the weight room, film sessions and practice fields and to doing all the things a champion does… especially when they didn't feel like it.
That's why they're champions.
What happens if we do the same with our dreams?
Effort and getting down to work are rightly celebrated because too many people stop at the dream phase. When I mentioned your mind has the power to direct you anywhere you choose, I left out the key component, which is the massive amount of effort and perseverance it requires to get there.
As Simon Sarris put it, “If you really want something, then the soul must make demands of the body."
There’s no shortcut to lasting success. The fastest way is to buckle down – right now – and get started. The long road you’re facing is paved with hard work. You have to build systems to get you there and assign goals that act as checkpoints along the way but it’s time, and up to you, to get busy. Big dreams take big efforts and even bigger levels of grit and stick-to-it-ness. You’ll have to ignore virtually everyone out there. Going along with the crowd rarely makes for greatness.
If you do what everyone else is doing, you will have nothing more than what everyone else has.
That’s a nuanced statement. If you do what Richard Branson does what will you have? Where will it lead if you only do what the average person does? If you want something more then you’re going to have to do something more. There are no two ways about it. Eva has always told her clients, “If you want something to change, you’re going to have to change something.”
Or, as the great Ronnie Coleman said, “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you always got.”
Ignore the naysayers. Dreams die on the hill of ridicule and questioning from others. You have to have the courage to follow your dreams despite what everyone else says. If you don’t do something different, they’ll never come true. Everyone has friends and family they love and who, despite loving you dearly in return, will try to keep you from chasing your version of the brass ring. In The Fountainhead, when Howard Roark was asked, “My dear fellow, who will let you?” he defied his detractors by saying, "That’s not the point. The point is who will stop me."
The greatest achievements in human history are the result of a dream and a vision brought to reality by a system. That vision and your refusal to take “no” for an answer will be what guides you in yours.
We can talk all day – and if you’re a client, we’ll spend plenty of time doing it – about ways to actually realize your dreams but first you have to have the unquenchable desire to make them happen. You have to quit changing goals and systems or you’ll never see your vision become reality. It will be tough to do and a fight to keep the results you worked so hard for.
Never give up on those dreams but understand that a big dream can be an illusion unless you use it to power everything you do into first making, and then keeping, it a reality. Falling short isn’t always a bad thing no matter what “they” tell you. You’ll find that falling short of a huge dream still gets you farther than you ever thought possible and a million miles past where they said you would.
Here’s an example of someone’s huge dream powering their relentless pursuit of it. Eva has a client who started his own company after serving as an Air Force fighter pilot. Right after opening his business, he sat down at the table one night and wrote something on a sheet of paper and then handed it to his wife.
He imagined turning his fledgling company into a billion-dollar a year business within ten years.
Every single thing he did from that point forward was directed towards making it come true. First thing in the morning, he asked himself what he needed to do that day in order to make it a reality. He ended his days by remembering his dream, the goals he had set and the systems he was putting in place to make it happen. Five years later, he’s busily working with an investment bank as they prepare to take his billion-dollar a year company public.
It all started with a dream. The relentless pursuit of it turned it into reality.
Show up with a big dream and a vision for what you want to do. Use it to fuel your attitude, your enthusiasm and your efforts. And never give up on it until you make it come true.
In the old movies they always ask, “Hey, what’s the big idea?”
It’s the beginning of your greatness.
Regards,
Henry
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