What was your dream...and why did it die?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

We all gather round and lend an ear when Dr. King’s famous “I have a dream” speech is on the tv or radio…its just one of those things that can’t be explained, it just is.

I had dreams as a child…we all do. I had dreams as a teen…we all did. I have dreams now…I always will.

I guess what I’m wanting to hear is:

When you were a kid, or a teen, or even now…what did you want to be, and why did it never happen? Or did it happen, and you realize that life is what you wanted, its what you made it…and your ready for the next dream.
I’ll start…

As long as I can remember I’ve wanted to act or model…I’ve always loved stage, drama, theater, and the whole nine yards. I love to sing and dance, and I regret never pursuing these things…even now, sometimes all I can think about is acting…about getting a chance at a movie or a stage piece…it’s my dream, it always has been.

I never pursued it because my parents were adamant against it…they fought me every step of the way and refused to ever let me audition for a part or act in local theater. They demanded that the lifestyle was wrong and it wasn’t what proper people did…they shoved me in other directions, and their discouragement and my fear of disappointing them is to this day the wall that stands in the way of my dream…
What was your dream, and why did it die?

-SS

2

I dreamed about being loved, but turned out to be unlovable.

3

I’m all alone, and then a snake wearing a vest and rolling a doughnut. OH, I mean, to find my bicycle (it wasn’t in the basement of the Alamo.) :frowning:

4

For many years my dream was I wanted a steady job, like every adult in town.

It got discarded when I left town, and nobody cared about those people or their politics or their plans for the parklands.

Suddenly, they all seemed like losers for sticking in one spot. I joined a riverboat company (in the land-side business office), got a complementary ride to Natchez, met a girl and we have been on the road every 3-4 months since, never returning to any place we’ve lived. Hope it never ends.

5

There’s no such thing.
I had a dream that I would have a pile of kids, but only had one. I had a dream that I would open a tea shop, the kind that you take your granny to. Everybody thought it was a dumb idea… now there are several here and they are very popular.

6

I always thought I would be working on Broadway by now. I went on 4 auditions, even got offered a roll, but turned it down because I didn’t want to leave school. I thought I had all the time in the world.
Now, when I have the experience and courage to do it, I have my daughter to think about and NYC is all the way across the country. I do alot of community and CLO theater and for now I’m happy with that. Sometimes though, when I watch something like the Tony Awards I think, wow… I coudda been a contenda… :wink:
But hey, never say never…:slight_smile:

SKYLASH…I feel bad that your parents did that to you. I can’t imagine squishing my childs dreams. Although if my daughter approached me about being an actress I would cringe, just because of all the work involved, and the stupid reputation theater people have for being wierd, outcast and “improper”. But if she had a real love for it I would support her all the way. Although the stage isn’t as fun and glitzy as people think, to someone who has a pure love of it… well, it can’t be described. I don’t know how old you are, but hey, there are community theaters in all cities…go out and find one… they are ALWAYS looking for some good people of all ages with a love and respect for the stage. Even if you don’t get a part, offer to work backstage. Stage Managing and Props are a blast. Most of the hard work done in the theater is done backstage… not on it, IMHO. Once you get in the door, people will get to know you and what you can do. Before you know it, your dreams come true. Good luck to you!! and go for it…!

7

My broken dream…

Growing up, more than anyting else, I wanted to become a Doctor. Of medicine that is, specifically, a surgeon.

I wanted to be the guy who saved peoples lives. The guy who knew how to take bodies apart and put them together again. The guy who could tell the worried family that their loved one would be OK, and put patients at ease. I wanted to treat patients with so much more compassion than the professionals I’ve experienced.

I wanted not fortune or fame, but recognition as a very talented individual, with knowledge and skills that very few people ever attain.

I wanted this all through middle school and high school, and all through my undergraduate studies. 1 semester short of my B.S. I got married and discovered I’d soon become a dad.
I got the degree, and my wife encouraged me to apply to the medical schools, and that we’d pick up and move wherever, and she - an attorney - would be able to support the family. Two years later, still never having applied, I decided not to pursue it. My family was more important.

Facing the fact we’d have to move away for 4 years for medical school, and then likely move again for another 4+ years of internship/residency, to finally get to move back home to join/start a practice and work like a madman to establish myself in the community was not appealing.

AND there would be no guarantee my family would still be there for me when that 10 years had passed. Kids are only young once, and I don’t want to miss one bit of their formative years.

Now five years after choosing not to do it, I am satisfied I made the right choice. I’ve never been able to watch ER on TV, I feel remorse that I’ve dropped my lifetime dream.

The feeling is rather like that scene in Kevin Costner’s Field of Dreams, where the young ball player is on the field and sees a boy choking. He steps off the field to save the boy’s life, knowing that he can’t go back. Only I’m in reverse. He left his love for his lifes calling, but I think I left my lifes calling for my love and my family.

I’m now an analytical chemist doing rather mundane, thankless work. I’d like to pick up a new dream: go back to school and become a Civil Engineer, but I’m still too burned out to do the school thing right now. Maybe next year…

8

Who wouldn’t love Anthracite? So much cleaner than Bituminous or (ugh!) Lignite!

To answer the OP…

When I was a kid, I dreamed of being a musician.
The dream died when I realized I was devoid of talent.

(Thank god!, I might add.)

9

As a kid, and all through high school, I wanted to end up working for NASA, making fuel for rockets (rocket scientist, I know - chemistry and physics, actually). When NASA lost funding (and I later found out just how bad they could be to work for), I gave up that idea. While the challenge would be fun, it just couldn’t make up for the idea of working in a bad environment for no pay. :slight_smile:

I also really wanted to be an archaeologist. I have this… fascination… for all the old stuff they dig up out of the ground, including and especially the ‘normal’ ones (I can’t explain it, it just is). I’d make a good one, too - I’m good with my hands (to handle and clean fragile things), I’m patient as heck, and I love doing things that other people sometimes call anal. And I don’t mind sitting in dirt all day for weeks on end just to uncover one item (I do that rockhounding anyway right? grin)

But the travel… I have a family. I do kinda regret losing that one, because I really do love it. But with two children and a husband, I need to do something closer to home. So I’m going in for an engineering degree. I like math, I like computers (doing electrical or computer e), so I should do ok - it’s just my third choice, not my first. grin

(oh, and anthracite, at least you aren’t Pure Sulphur :slight_smile: )

-Elthia

10

Just a small dream that I’d nearly forgotten about… I wanted to swim with dolphins. Maybe even be a marine biologist.

Two weeks ago on my honeymoon/diving vacation, I got to dive with an orphaned, adolescent bottlenose who loves people. Wasn’t part of the plan, didn’t even know about him before we went, and it was the most incredible experience…

11

i still dream of opening up a place where kids in NYC can come after school and be mentored. ever since i got out of high school i’ve wanted to start a mentor program that involved actual proffessionals devoting their time to help show teens what the jobs out in life are really like, to let them know that it’s not just what they see on tv, or what they see in books in school (the way my class was so mislead), but to get a hands on experience in whatever field we have proffessionals mentoring in, and perhaps give these kids a lead on developing some goals, and dreams of their own, other than becoming crack dealers or forever flipping burgers.
alas, i am still trying to get out of my own rut of a job to find something that pays better, so i can afford to live in this overpriced city. it’s home. but one day perhaps my dream will come true. i’m hoping patience and persistence will lead me there.

12

Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams die
Life is broken-winged bird
That can not fly.

Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go,
Life is a barren field,
Frozen with snow.
-Langston Hughes

Sky, screw your parents. You are an adult now, and it’s not too late. They can only judge you now, not hold you back from your dreams.

Anthracite, it sounds cliqued, but until you love yourself, no one else can. Work on likeing yourself, work up to loving yourself, and then you won’t need other people. And that is when they will appear in your life.

honkytonkwillie, when I used to ask my father what he did for a living when I was little, he’d tell me “My job is being a dad. My work is another story.” I don’t know how old your children are, but your devotion to them is NOT unapprechiated.

I don’t have any dreams that I have given up on yet. I’m only 20, I have 60 years left on this earth to do my damnedest to make sure that they happen.

13

I was going to be an actress, but I am scared to death of speaking in public. Rather, the THOUGTH of speaking in public is not scary, but once I actually have to get up there, I just blank.
And I was in a couple of plays in high school and I wasn’t very good.

I was going to be an astronaut, but I hated physics. And math.

What I like about dreams is how they change. As long as I hold on to the confidence that I am smart and creative, I can mold that into a lot of different specific dreams… and follow them until I get bored or until something different comes along. It’s all part of the ride of life.

14

Sky - If it is important enough to you, you can still make it happen. But only you can decide whether your acting dream is worth whatever price you’d pay in your relationship with your parents. For a moment, put yourself in the role of a person nearing the end of life: what will be your biggest regret: not following your dream, or displeasing your parents?

For myself, I also permitted a parent to squash my dreams. I haven’t really had a dream since about 4th grade. My mom figured that the way to avoid disappointment was to want and expect nothing. My mother’s pessimistic attitude has been difficult to overcome. I have overcome it to some degree or I wouldn’t be where I am today, but I still can’t dream. I envy my husband because he has a wonderful dream for retirement that, among other things, provides great mental calm when he needs to escape for a few minutes from his daily stresses.

If you have dreams, cherish them.

15

Oh, gosh . . . for the longest time, I wanted to be an animator for Disney. Or a comic book artist. I started drawing in fourth grade, and by the time I was in high school, I was pretty good. Except, I didn’t take an art class until I was a senior, and my parents, I suppose, didn’t realize that it was really that important to me, and I wasn’t very good at vocalizing it.

I wanted to go to a pretty exclusive school in NYC. I had teachers willing to write me letters of recommendation, and a portfolio that might just have been good enough. Two things deterred me, though:

  • it was $10K a year, and there was no way my parents could afford it.

  • my dad gave me what I’ve come to think of as “the odds” speech - how all these little boys start playing football as kids, but only a few of them get onto a team in high school, and only a few of them play regularly, and of those, only a tiny percentage make it onto a college team, and only a few of those play regularly, and of them only a tiny, miniscule few play professionally.

What I think my dad was trying to do was get me to look at it realistically - determine if it was something I wanted so badly I was willing to put in the work necessary. At the time, it felt like he was telling me there was no way to get what I wanted.

I wish someone had just sat down and told me that I really could do anything I wanted to - but that it would take a lot of work. Maybe I couldn’t have gone to that one particular university that offered a bachelor degree in animation, but that doesn’t mean I couldn’t have found another, more affordable one somewhere else.

I did end up getting an art degree, but I still copped out and got a commercial art degree - my parents were adamant that I should be able to “earn a living”. Well, it turned out that I have no interest in commercial art, and I would have been a hell of a lot better off getting a fine art degree - especially if I want to get a masters someday.

I still dream, but most of those dreams have become a sort of "oh, I’ll never do that . . . " instead of a “yeah, I want this to happen someday, so let’s get busy.”

16

“I had a DREAM—A dream about YOU, baby!”

Like several others, I wanted to be an actress—but, thank goodness, I did indeed give it the Old College Try. For about six years, I did TV commercials, summer stock, Off-Broadway, little theater. LOVED the actual acting part, where I was in front of an audience doing good work. But that only comprised 1% of being an actress. Most of it was chasing around for work, being rejected, not even being able to get INTO auditions because the damn unions had 'em sewn up . . . And when I did get work, most of what I did was crap. Meryl Streep was doing “Sophie’s Choice” and I was doing Delchamp’s Supermarket commercials.

Thank goodness I finally realized, “hey—I really hate this!” while I was still young enough to go into something else. So, I guess my dream didn’t “die,” I beat it to death with a hammer.

17

Skyslash, I’m sorry. But if you’re still breathing, and truly want it, it can be yours.

Anthracite, your post made me ache; as Sue said, there’s no such thing as someone unlovable; If you don’t agree, feel free to email me and convince me why.

I had a minor dream to become a veterinarian, and had even gone to Purdue to look at their program (one of the best in the country, btw). Then the kids started coming, and well, 17 years later, I’m not a vet, and at this point am not sure I would even seriously want to be anymore.

My Daughter, Kandis, has held onto the dream of being a marine biologist since age 11 (she’s 13), and even knows which college she wishes to attend. She also wants to be military, and so is leaning toward a Naval ROTC scholarship. She has the grades and the drive to support it!

My eldest daughter wants to be a singer, has the voice and the aptitude, and is currently taking voice lessons form our college vocal director.

Our middle daughter doesn’t quite know what she wants yet, but at 13, there’s a little time yet!

18

phouka, its not too late. i was kinda in the same boat, joined the army to pay for college though, and went to FIT instead of my choice of SVA 'cause the only state and city schools were paid for by the army in the deal i got. Ended up going for Illustration, was told about how i could go work for Disney and do animation (got really excited), then did my research. Ended up being that for the most part, you’re contracted to work for a certain amount of time without the ability to work for anyone else, and the pay sucked, and they get treated like dirt. So, to my later realization, after completing my degree in graphic design, and then finishing up with certifications in A+ and Network Administration, i find myself happy to be in the field i’m in. I know people that switched, and went into comic books and animation anyway, they had no problems, just took some persistence. Most of them learned a lot on the job. So don’t give up on dreams. you still have a chance if you want… :slight_smile:

19

I’ve always dreamt of being a novelist or screenwriter.

The dream hasn’t quite died yet, but my life has been so hectic for the past 3 years since I got out of the military that I haven’t had time to sit down and work on any of ny ideas.

20

Well for me it is too late. I wanted to have my own catering business. But knowing it’s too late makes me doubly sure I impress upon my son that yes, he CAN do anything, and that I support his dreams fully.