Whether you’re in high school or university, there is an unchanging perception. According to this perception, if you sit in the front rows of the classroom you’re entitled as a “hardworking student”, but if you sit in the back seats you become a naughty one. Also, there are the ones who sit by the window and always peek out the window. Those ones love to dream…

Dream lovers wake up in the morning and keep on daydreaming. Such attribute is seen as waste of time by many people; however, in fact, these ‘dreams’ are the secret tool that take the dreamers beyond time. 

Honestly, I hadn’t sympathized daydreaming in the past. During my high school years, I would sit by a cold wall right at the back of the classroom, but not by the window. Therefore, my dreams were limited to the ones of my family, my teachers or my elders. Back then, engineering, medicine, law, advocacy were popular professions, therefore I had to choose between them while shaping my future. When I finished high school, I took the university exam aiming to study one of the most popular degrees, however, I got into department of English teaching at a university in my hometown. Fortunately, this time I was lucky to sit by the window that had an endless sea view. By this window, the first and foremost realization I reached was that I hadn’t had much interest in Shakespeare. My first meaningful dream, on the other hand, was to leave my hometown, stand on my own feet and discover the life itself in a big city. To realize my dream, I retook the university exam two years later and -with my father’s disapproval and my mother’s support- I left my hometown to study in Ankara. 

Indeed, a success journey always starts with a dream, however, “Whomever these dreams belong to is very important”. “Because, we live the life of that person whose dreams we follow”. 

Well, why would we live a life following someone else’s dreams, why would we ever allow this?

Because, maybe we don’t know our purpose of life, we don’t know ourselves, we don’t know our interests and the things we enjoy doing?

Maybe, we are not aware of our strength. 

Maybe, we don’t dream proactively, maybe we are afraid.

To be able to live the life we dream of, we first need to dream, then, turn our dreams into our goals and take a firm action so that those dreams are embodied. 

In order to fulfill our dreams, there are certain things that I believe must be turned into habits. I’ll state 3 three habits which I find crucial: 

The first one is to SAVE, the second one is IDLENESS and the last one is AMATEURISM. Let’s take a look at these habits together…

The most important of the three might be to SAVE, therefore my suggestion to you would be to own a piggy bank for your dreams. 

What should be saved in your “piggy bank for dreams”

I suggest you initially save people in your piggy bank. People who sit beside you during your journey playing songs that will let you enjoy life; who sometimes act as a navigator leading you the way; who always inspire you; who challenge your ideas saving you from getting rusty and who is better than you at least in one thing…

I say you throw heroes in your piggy bank… For example, research on the leading people in areas of your interest. Read and watch the stories of groundbreaking artists, people who bring new innovation to the world, cook, dance, write, design, travel the world with their backpacks. Internalize how they lived, how they fulfilled their dreams and how they overcame the obstacles they faced. However, I would like to underline that you should enrich your dreams with the inspiration you get from these people, but not with their dreams. 

The second habit you should have is: IDLENESS

But don’t mix idleness with laziness. Because, there is a very thin red line between them. Idleness, in fact, is a source of inspiration, a miraculous catalyst that consists of dream, idea and knowledge that “appeases your hunger”.

Idleness is taking a break in our lives that we remember to “pause”. Because these days the life goes by very fast. In the meanwhile, we try to do everything without disconnecting from the digital world. Can you imagine? While we work, as the majority of people in Turkey, we spend 2.5 hours on average in social media, we focus on our phone screen and try to catch something new every time we scroll down. Actually, you can understand my point by taking a look at your phone’s battery usage. Nowadays, nobody stops, but we sometimes need to pause in order to move forward. Give yourself a break to dream. Treat yourself with a coffee in your favorite café and search through a book for inspiration. Visit the restaurant you always wanted to try and put your phone on silent while you spend some time chatting with others. Put on your headphones when you’re walking on the streets and listen to your favorite song on repeat while you dive into your dreams. 

Idleness gives you awareness and the chance to get to know yourself better. The universe continuously tries to show you some things, you just need to notice.  Figurately, the life gives you the ingredients to cook; your job is to choose between the ingredients and write down the recipe. Because, you are the only one who can write the recipe of your own dream.   

The last habit you should have is AMATEURISM. The word amateur comes from the Latin word ‘amare’ which means ‘to love’.

You need to love your dreams and be passionate about your goals. You can be a real amateur only as long as you go after your dreams with passion and without the fear of failure. 

The kids are the best amateurs. If you go to a playground and ask children “Who can be an astronaut or a famous actor?”, all of them will answer “Me, me, me!”. Because, there is no word such as “I can’t” in their dictionary, meaning the kids don’t know about learned helplessness. At this point, learned helplessness needs to be mentioned. Learned helplessness is the belief in inability to change the outcome resulting from the person’s similar past experiences. 

Our imagination “diminishes” as we grow old. According to the Dream Map research, 14% of adults in Turkey say that they dream. In fact, if you get out of learned helplessness, and get rid of our fears and ‘dream with courage’ like children or ‘dare to dream’ we can change our life and we can even the world. 

Where was I left off… I quit studying English studies and went to Ankara to study economics. After a joyful university journey- it was a little too joyful that I studied in the university for 5 years- I graduated. 

Later, I started working as a sales representative in a multinational company. I had to start earning money after spending 7 years in university. But -I’d ask myself- was this my dream job? Honestly, I didn’t know for sure. 

However, in the meantime, I started saving in the piggy bank for my dreams, get to know myself by idling and starting to realize my capabilities.

When I started understanding myself, my goals and my dreams, I realized that there was another important topic: I shared a lot of common dreams and goals with the company I worked for and I had the opportunity to improve my dreams in an amateurish way. This opportunity helped me throughout my 30 years journey from being a sales representative to being a member of board of directors. Every Monday I went to work happily and lived the life I dreamt of by continuously adding value to it.

If you dare to dream and go after your dream with courage, one day you surely succeed. 

If you can’t fly into your goals, run towards them. If you can’t run, walk. 

If you can’t walk, crawl; but NEVER EVER give up on dreaming.

LIVE THE LIFE YOU DREAMT OF WITH COURAGE