Why You Need to Start Dreaming Again
Living through hard seasons of uncertainty & heartache threaten our very design to dream and create. Get back to living your best life with these 3 steps.
By Audrey Hardin, MS LPC
If you’re like me, even though living through a global pandemic is behind us, moving out of a state of survival, self-protection, and just coping is easier said than done.
Even now, I observe how many people just go through the motions, as if they’re still shut down to what’s going on around them…even inside of them. Alive, yet totally asleep.
I get it. Up until recently, I found myself so lost in my routine of work, eating, binge watching tv or social media, repeat, that I didn’t even realize how small I shrank my world. My social life, trying new things, setting goals, and creativity all virtually diminished in the wake of some very hard seasons.
It felt safer to stay in this mundane routine than to risk the possibility of more pain.
DID YOU KNOW?
With such drastic changes to our global and personal worlds, it’s no wonder why we stopped dreaming —it’s biological!
Our brains shut all creative juices off when there is a threat to our survival -physically, relationally, or emotionally. Before we can get back to utilizing both sides of our brain, we must wake up and evaluate where we are.
I reached the point that I hope many will soon reach: the thought of continuing my “safe” [protective and predictable] routine for one more second felt suffocating. I felt desperate for change. However, to change up my life would require me to risk.
What do we risk when we step out of survival mode? Being hurt; the other shoe dropping; feeling our grief; hurting others; disappointing God or disappointing ourselves… just to name a few.
Can I tell you the greater risk? Missing out on fulfilling God’s calling on your life and ALL the incredible blessings he wants to bestow to you, his child!
No, God is not a genie, but he is a loving Father who delights to give his children good things. And that means you!
To experience the goodness, we must open ourselves up to both pain and joy. You can’t have one without the other. When you shut out the bad, you shut out the good with it. God designed us to have capacity for both.
I invite you to begin to trust him with both again.
So, what’s the point of Dreaming again?
1. It gets us back to our original design. Our original function.
Imagine if you’ve been using your can-opener as a hammer for years. Sure, it could bang a few nails in…but when you use that can-opener to do the function its creator intended it to do, opening canned food, you’ll optimize its greatest potential!
We were created to create just as God created the world and all the beauty in it, when we imagine, dream, and create beauty, we are living at our greatest potential.
2. It alerts us to our desires and longings.
“Desire lies at the heart of who God made us to be, who we are at our core. Desire is both our greatest frailty and the mark of our highest beauty.” -Dan Allender
In Psalm 37:4 when God says he wants to give us the desires of our heart, part of owning our desires is making space to dream of the possibilities of seeing those desires be fulfilled. Our deepest desires lead us to dreaming big dreams. Without these dreams, we would miss out on fulfilling God’s plan to lead us to live out our calling and use our gifts to change the world! (Isaiah 64:8).
3. It balances grief.
If you’ve followed us for a while you know how much we talk about the importance of grieving everyday –because every day we experience some form of loss or hurt. But if all we did was grieve, we would not be living the full spectrum of the life God created for us to live.
Grief can be the fertile soil to which your dreams can grow and hope can be restored –beauty from ashes.
It has been through grieving my lost relationships that my dream of finding safe, loving, and mutually giving relationships bloomed and later realized.
4. It keeps us in an active relationship with God.
By owning my grief and desires and trusting God to meet me in them, I am in constant communication with and reliance on him.
My daily prayer looks something like this: Lord, I need you. I seek you and you alone to meet me in my grief, suffering, and failures. I praise you for how you redeem and rebuild. Do not forget me. Hear my cry. In you and you alone my hope is found. You can do the impossible. Lighten my load so I can dream and believe you and your promises. I trust you to provide the help I need for today.
5. It restores our Hope.
Dreaming activates our hearts to be more attuned to the blessings and graces God pours out daily.
When all we do is fight to survive, we miss out on what God is doing. We are to live a life of faith and dependency, not one of white knuckling and self-dependency.
We are only able to dream when we put our security in the hands of our capable Father. When we do, we begin to see the truth of Jesus’ words in Luke 18:27 “what is impossible with man is possible with God!”
Are you with me?
If you’re ready to start dreaming again but have no idea where to start, I encourage you to DO 3 STEPS:
1. You’ve got to PLAY in order to start dreaming.
My friend took me to Disneyworld to remember what it was like to be little Audrey who dreamed of dancing with her prince and believed the world could be an even better and happier place if she just believed. It was magical and truly turned the lights on to parts of me I neglected for years
Choose an activity that you enjoyed as a child or a place that ignites imagination and creativity! Build a fort, go camping, get out your American girl dolls, or old train set, get out the paint brushes, or woodworking tools, dance or throw a water balloon fight! Engage in it wholeheartedly.
2. Go to a place you feel most safe and free to be yourself.
I invite you to invite “little you” to come sit by you and ask him or her to remind you of what you used to dream about and remember a time when it was most easy for you to do so. Soak in what that was like. Follow up with step 3.
3. Freehand Journal.
Turn on some inspirational music (preferably without words). Write this question at the top of the page: “What do I want?” and let your heart and hand just go for it. Nothing is out of the question.
After you read them out loud, even better if to a trusted friend, select your top 3 things out of at least 20 dreams you listed and say no to everything else to streamline your focus on the top 3. GO. FOR. IT!
Remember, no change happens when we stop showing up to the table with our dreams, desires, fears, and failures.
Take the next step today!
Audrey Hardin is a Therapist, Speaker, and Workshop Leader at Hardin Life Resources in Dallas and McKinney, TX.
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