adminZachary Aldwin Milkshake in the Boardroom
“Matchmaker, matchmaker make me a match, find me a find, catch me a catch” is the plaintive cry of Tevye’s daughters in the musical Fiddler on the Roof as they wish for the village matchmaker to bring them the husband of their dreams.
Would it not just be awesome if we could do that sing a catchy tune about how wonderful our life will be and then wait for it to happen.
It sounds almost magical. Think about how easy life would be if someone else managed all the details of your life for you, all you had to do was “wish upon a star” and your mystical fairy godmother would appear and take care of the rest.
The only problem with the matchmaker/fairy godmother scenario is that you are handing your dreams over to a third party who may end up bringing you a nightmare rather than the stuff of your dreams.
There was a lot of noise a couple of years ago about a concept called “The Secret”. Some of you may have seen the video or read the book.
On a very surface level the concept dealt with the idea of visualising your dream and thus causing the universe to bring it to you.
It caused quite a stir, and not just because it openly encouraged a step into something that appears beyond natural.
Now I’m walking a fine line here. If I totally decry the idea of the miraculous then I will get shot down by any reader with a religious persuasion.
Err too far on the side of the supernatural and anyone secular in their thought patterns will condemn the article as mystical nonsense.
The idea of visualisation is not unique to “The Secret” in fact a large amount of psychological research has been put into various facets of it.
Much of the effects of visualisation, and its counterpart of self-affirmation, can be explained by how the mind works.
The biggest warning about visualisation is this, it is a means to an end, it is not the end. Too many people just visualise and then wait.
The problem occurs when imagining the goal and then expecting it to miraculously appear takes the place of actually doing anything to actively achieve it.
That is the problem with most dreams, they are simply wishful thinking. Many dreams could be great goals because we can see them rather vividly. But then we stop. We never move beyond them. We never do.
“If I win the lottery”, “when I get a raise”, “when the economy stabilises” become our personal matchmakers.
We wait on an external set of circumstances to be right before we actually do anything about moving towards the dream.
We become stagnant waiting on a dream rather than being proactive to pursue it. Perhaps an example will help.
As much as I may belittle the idea of fairy godmothers, I am rather fond of Disneyland. I would like to go there.
So there it is a dream to go to Disneyland with the wonderful lady in my life. Now it can stay a dream, a dream that may happen when I win the lottery, or when things pick up a bit, or when pigs learn to fly so I don’t have to pay for an air ticket. If I think like that I will never go.
Instead I could check the prices of airfares, hotels and the Disney theme parks. I could consider the idea of going to Paris instead of America.
I could speak to people who have been and find out how they did it. I could examine options like travel clubs.
Maybe my air-miles could add up overtime. I could find out when the off-season is when I could get better deals, how much can I save through advance booking.
I could do something. Movement, any movement, is better than stagnation. As I research a few things could happen, I could stumble upon a special online, or a simple word with my travel agent could have them send me a deal in a few months.
Suddenly my dream becomes more of a reality, it may take a bit of time and it may look a little different to the way I imagined but next thing I find myself under the stars watching the fireworks at Magic Kingdom.
Wow Zach that sounds like a lot of effort. Of course, it is, not as much as you may think though and the results are worth it.
For me the real miracle is what happens when you start to move towards a goal, even if you are not completely sure of your steps.
Suddenly opportunities appear that you may not have seen before. I moved premises last week after being in the same location for nearly a dozen years.
Suddenly a colleague who I have dealt with for almost the same length of time goes: “Hey wait these clients of mine are really close to your new place, let me send them to you.”
During renovations I had a dozen different ideas thrown my way that I would never have thought of before I started the process.
I had to start moving first. Even the location only showed up on my radar after I started bandying about the idea of moving, and when it came up it was perfectly where I wanted.
Many times articles like this one only really flesh out properly as I begin to write. I often start typing with a fragment of an idea or in this case the line of a song in my head. Once in a while there has been no idea at all, but as I write, as I move, clarity of thought appears.
For your dream to become real you need to take steps towards finding a way to make it happen.
Leaving your ideas at the mercy of the matchmaker means a lot less effort for you. In fact, it means that you spend the same amount of effort as doing nothing, with the same result.
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