What if you are living your dream and it is really hard work? Is it still a dream?
Earlier this summer, while on a working vacation, I wondered about this while watching the trainers/performers with the whales and dolphins in the shows at Sea World.
It must be a dream come true for them to be working and performing at Sea World. But it is also hard work.
So does it feel like a dream?
My husband always jokes that he and other federal law enforcement agents are “living the dream.” They say it tongue-in-cheek, with this unspoken recognition that they get to do the job many people dream of doing, and that it isn't really all that dreamy in real life. Their jobs are not the stuff of TV crime shows and news segments. Instead, they work for months, years even, to get a big break on a case. Condensed into a 60 minute TV show, it looks a lot cooler than it actually is. So they're living the dream — they are — but not.
For me, living my dream of running a business is hard work. On that working vacation, I got up at 5 am because there were emails to answer, clients to serve. And anytime I try to take a day off, when I sneak a look at my cell phone while enjoying time with family, there is always work waiting.
But sometimes there is something wonderful waiting, too.
On the day at Sea World, I received an e-mail of encouragement, one that helped me realized I am making a difference.
Yes, the hard work is definitely worth it to live my dream.
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What do you think? If you are living your dream and it is really hard work, is it still a dream?
Is the dream in the doing or the having done it?
This post is from Becky Robinson of Weaving Influence, with whom I am happily co-hosting a Dare, Dream, Do webinar on August 2.