{ #Dreamer }

I am a dreamer.  I dream vividly and in color every night. Sometimes my dreams have meaning and other times my dreams are frightening.  Some days I even dream with my eyes open.  Nevertheless, I am a firm believer that dreams are powerful. 

Dreams are so powerful that they occasionally cause people to forget the reason why they started dreaming in the first place.  As children we dream about the future and then as adults, we dream up an entirely new future.  Never (well almost never) do we take a moment to enjoy the present.  A moment to enjoy the beauty that we had once dreamt about and now live in.

For me, my dream was to become a successful professional.  I did not care what it took to get there, but I knew I had to be there.  After I had visualized a future for myself and of course internalized a few short-comings, I ran towards my end goal 2,000 miles per hour. Life was great!

I zoomed through college as fast as I could, then zoomed through interviews, then my first internship, then my first job, then my new role, then another role, then another role, and so on. It all seemed great until it was not.

It was as if my mind, body, and spirit became detached.  Immediately I pressed pause and decided to take a break from the grind. I had spent six years focused on staying ahead, networking, interviewing, reading, researching, and working 60 hour weeks, i.e., building a career. It was time for a break!

Not a vacation. A break.

It was difficult for me to turn down new projects, but I was finally able to live my dream.  Six years ago, I was a college graduate running around Atlanta trying to land my dream job.  Today, I am working for that dream company in a role that did not exist six years ago! 

When I said those words out loud at a networking event six months ago, it finally hit me.  The little black girl who grew up on subsidized housing programs had accomplished a dream. Why not celebrate this moment in life?!

That very next day I took time off to do just that, bask in life. Being able to relax is the real reason why we work so hard right?  Well, it should be.  Life is more than chasing dreams and years of hard work. You have to know when its time to wake up and smell the roses.