If you’ve ever had the opportunity to listen to motivational speakers, you understand dreaming. Back in the early days of the 50s and 60s, dreaming was promoted a lot more than it is now. I’m not talking about the night time dreaming, I’m talking about the day dreaming of what a person really wants to accomplish in their life. At one time it was called the “American Dream”. The time spent in youth or early twenties, when we planned out in our minds what we really wanted to achieve is the American dream and then we accomplished it. We made it a reality.

Most people from the baby boomer age had a dream at one time or another to really accomplish something in their life and if we didn’t follow through on that dream, it was pushed aside for other more pressing matters. By now it is probably almost non-existent. So what happened to those dreams? What happened to the dreams of our people in the greatest country in the world? They seemed to be squished.

From “A Better Life: Creating The American Dream”, Kate Ellis and Ellen Guettler, say “The American dream has roots in the nation's loftiest ideals - the right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. There are many facets to the American dream, including a strong belief in freedom, and a powerful desire to consume.” The American Dream is not just the owning of big houses and cars, it’s an attitude: an attitude of hard work and persistence to accomplish something great. It’s the belief of the right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We are a resilient people and when we put our minds to accomplishing something—we get it done.

From John C. Maxwell’s book, “Put Your Dream to the Test,” he says that “dreams are valuable commodities and they propel us forward. They give us energy and make us enthusiastic.”

One inspirational story from his book is about a teen, Andy Hull, who took his dream and used his talent and hard work to make it come true. Andy Hull had a dream of creating his own music and distributing CDs on his own label. Starting in high school he home schooled his senior year while he worked to record his own album at a studio. He went on to find a music company (Sony) which let him create, Favorite Gentlemen, his own recording label. Since then he has signed on ten bands which produced fifteen records so far. This all started with a dream.

So go back in time in your mind to when you had a dream of accomplishing something and bring it out of obscurity. We need to revive our dreams and make them realities. Renew the faith in yourself and what you can accomplish and life will once again take on a new meaning.

Loxley resident Valerie J. Steimle is the author of three books, “Home Is Where The Heart Is, Home Is Where The Learning Is: Homeschool Lifestyles from Home school Moms” and her newest book, “Of One Heart: Being Single in the LDS World” all available on Amazon.com. Contact her at valeriesteimle@yahoo.com or visit her website at www.strengthenourhome.com.