“Day Dream (Explore!)” Creative Commons by Loving Earth

I have a 3 year old son who seems to have some amazing clarity and insight into life. It never fails to surprise me when he says something that stops me in my tracks and makes me reconsider everything. Maybe it’s because the mind of a 3 year old is uncluttered and unfettered by the ingrained biases and rules that we “grown ups” live with. Anyway, this weekend was Valentine’s Day and my little guy was eating a box of Sweethearts (you know…the little candy hearts with catchy sayings on them). Well, he got one that said “Dream Big”. He thought about it for a moment and then said “Actually, I dream little. That’s why all my dreams come true”. SLAM! In two short seconds he hit the “grown up” idea of dreaming big in the solar plexus. Almost as soon as he said it, he was on to the next thing and smiling and enjoying his life.

But, those few simple words dove deep inside of me and got me really thinking. We were always told as kids to dream big. And there’s nothing wrong with that. In fact my little guy dreams of being the first person to walk on Mars. But I think that we get so hung up on our big dreams that we forget or lose sight of those little ones. And by getting caught up in our big dreams, we usually set ourselves up for disappointment of some kind or another. If we’d focus more on those smaller goals (our “little dreams”) we’d find out that we accomplish amazing things every day, just in small increments. By recognizing these smaller goals we’d feel a sense of constant accomplishment and that leads to a sense of happiness on a very frequent basis. So, maybe my little guy is on to something. As far as I can tell, he’s the happiest person I know. So go ahead, dream small and make your dreams come true!

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