Accepting the dreams we discover
When writing Wednesday's post, I realized that I had overlooked an important aspect of discovering a dream. It's not enough to find the dream. We must then accept it. This topic is tricky because it sounds like something inherently easy and obvious. We think that when we find our dream, it will be a perfect fit. We believe it will feel like the puzzle piece we've been missing all our life. And hopefully, it will, but that's not always the case. When you finally discover a dream (and this is not for every dream), there is a period where you have to decide to accept this dream into your life. It's almost like the dream is standing at your front door, and like a vampire, you have to invite it in. It won't come in of its own volition, no matter how much it feels like it was made for you.
I'll give a few examples. Getting married has always been a dream of mine. I was desperate for a fairy tale love, and I wanted my parent's story: high school sweethearts, married right out of college, and chasing a dream life together ever since. Of course, that was a glamorized, pocket-size version of their story, but the love is very real. So it was a great disappointment when I did not meet the love of my life in high school. No one wanted to date me (or actively pursued me, which might be more accurate), and I had pity dates to both proms set up by my small group leader. So the picture-perfect romance I had in my head wasn't going to happen, but the dream of finding love remained, and I was ready to flex my plan to meet it.
And then, senior year of college, it all happened. I met a man who was in the Air Force (definitely not part of the plan), and we fell in love. Our story is incredibly special to us, and we wouldn't have it any other way, but I had to accept the military aspect of our lives. That was not something I wanted, and frankly, I am not big on not getting what I want, which does not work well when the Air Force dictates so many aspects of our lives. Here's the thing, I loved Jacob. I knew that this was the love I had been dreaming about for years, I knew this was the man I was supposed to marry, and I knew that Jacob was called to the military: that was his dream.
So I had a choice: accept this version of my dream or walk away from it entirely. Obviously, I chose to accept it because here we are at three years of marriage, absolutely loving life with our seven-month-old son. But I remember the make-or-break moment for me. Jacob was in tech school for the majority of our time dating. In February of 2019 (two months before we got engaged), he attended a briefing where they told him that he would have to do a one-year unaccompanied deployment to Korea at some point in his career. I was nannying when he called to tell me that. Sitting on the floor of the family's living room watching their eight-month-old play with blocks, I felt my heart sink and heard a voice in my head quietly say, "jump ship, you can't handle this" (It was, of course, my fear talking).
The voice was right. A year-long deployment was not an experience that I was equipped to handle. But what I realized, in that moment, was that the voice in my head wasn't me. Call it whatever you like, the enemy, the devil on your shoulder, or a dragon of self-doubt, it wasn't me talking, and it certainly wasn't the woman I wanted to become. It was fear trying to hold me in place. I knew that if I went through something like that, I would come out the other side so much stronger and more capable than I could ever imagine. It was in that moment that I truly accepted my dream of being Jacob's wife. It took a lot longer for me to accept the label of a military spouse. I spent a lot of time thinking that I could separate myself, in some way, from the military and its influence in my life. But eventually, I got there too. Accepting these things doesn't mean everything is picture-perfect when it comes to military life (I still do a lot of complaining, as you've seen here). But, it does mean that I've accepted the aspects of my dream that weren't what I thought they would be, and I am working to become more capable as this dream demands.
Another example is this dream right here, my dream of writing and making things better for military spouses worldwide. This dream came to me in pieces and still gets clearer every day, but I had to accept each aspect as it came about. I had to accept that I was called to be a writer. I have dealt with so much self-doubt and imposter syndrome that I have had difficulty placing that label on myself. Even today, I am scared that people will see me as nothing more than an unqualified mommy blogger with too much time and arrogance on her hands. Hopefully, none of you think that of me, but honestly, accepting a dream isn't about what other people think. It's about coming to terms with fulfilling the desires of your heart.
This started my journey as a writer, and it was much further along the way that I realized I wanted to write for military spouses specifically. Going into writing my book, I knew that "everyone" was not a good target demographic. Every publishing company will tell you that no book is ever written for everyone. I just hadn't figured out my niche yet. Then I began to get more involved in the military community. I began to allow some aspects of it to shape my identity and accepted the fact that marrying Jacob meant becoming a military spouse.
There were so many stigmas to military spouses that I wasn't ready to take on and fight against. But the more I allowed this life to become part of who I am (certainly not all of who I am), I realized how much hurt and need this community has. I realized how much hurt and need I had. I cannot fix all the issues with this life, and I probably can't even identify all of them, but dreams are somewhere I can help. It's somewhere that I am trying to change my life. It's a way that I am working to better myself and my life, so maybe I can help someone else who finds themselves in similar shoes. I am still working on myself to feel qualified to pursue this dream but accepting any dream is the first step to achieving it. And with so many dreams, we only become qualified once we put in the work for them.
You see, the small dreams don't require much, if any, acceptance. It doesn't (usually) take much to accept that seeing Shinedown in concert or flying to Italy is a dream. Those dreams matter just as much, but it can be easier to declare these dreams for yourself. It's the big dreams that can require some acceptance. When you feel a weight on your heart to help someone in need, go beyond yourself into something new, or truly sacrifice your level of comfort, that's when it can take some time and work to accept. The option always remains for us not to accept these dreams that seem so far beyond what we expected for ourselves, but these dreams promise an incredible life if we take the time to welcome them in.