At some point in your life, you may have the opportunity to not only pursue your dream but also live it. But try not to make the mistake that I did and live your dream and try to kill it at the same time.
I know that sounds confusing but when I say ‘living and killing your dream’, what I am referring to is that situation where you are in a great position to live your dream to the fullest but you do things to self sabotage your ability to live the dream to the fullest.
One of the dangers and problems that I had when I was running my own law firm was that I had quite a few other friends who were also running their own law firms as well. And I fell into this devastating trap of comparing the success of my firm to the success of theirs.
I had friends who had their own office buildings. I had friends who had multiple staff in high-rise downtown locations and upscale locations. I had individuals who had a staff of anywhere between 5 and up to 30.
And it was tough because even though none of my friends ever made me feel inferior to them, I allowed myself to feel inadequate when compared to their firm. And once those feelings of doubt start to creep in, you start under-valuing what you are doing and you start underestimating what you’re capable of. So what is happening is you may avoid taking necessary steps, or you may avoid exploring other opportunities, or you may just fall into this belief that you are solely at the top of what you’re able to do.
Now, fortunately for me I was in a good position because I had my wife as my office manager who was quick to shoot that noise down. She was very quick to let me know that the grass is not always as green. She was quick to remind me that my firm was going strong for years. She was quick to remind me that my firm has made more money each year than the previous year. She was quick to remind me that my firm gave me the ability to live the lifestyle that we wanted to live.
In other words, she wanted me to know that I was much more successful than I was giving myself credit for and that I was living my dream in a way that was consistent with how I wanted to live it. And she was also ensuring that I would not stay in this mindset of believing that I had to live my dream based on the standard of others because by doing that I was effectively killing my dream.
You’re gonna have a lot of great opportunities to pursue your dream. That’s the easy part. The hard part comes when you start doing things to hold yourself back and keep yourself from living your dream to the fullest. You are effectively killing your dream while you’re living it at the same time. Just remember that not everyone has the ability to live their dreams so when you get the opportunity to do so, leave it to the fullest and enjoy everything that comes along with it. And just remember that not everybody can be as lucky as you.
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