When I was young I wanted to be rich and famous. For as long as I can remember I had dreamed of becoming a famous singer, and not just the way most people dream of these things. I actually planned it out and worked my butt off trying to make it happen. I was going to have a breakout single with my girl group (this was the late 90s when girl groups and boy bands were everything), we’d become the next Spice Girls, I’d move to a big gorgeous mansion on the coast of Florida, marry my boy band crush and live happily ever after. I got closer than you’d expect! I recorded music and even got a song on a college radio station. I was accepted into college to learn how to become an independent artist. My dad moved to Florida and so I had a second home there. And I did in fact meet that specific boy bander and spoke to him and his friends pretty regularly for a while. But life happens, celebrity crushes fade and the universe has its plans for us.
A few months ago I found myself feeling pretty down about it all though. I didn’t regret the choices I’ve made exactly, but I felt like I had failed to make my dream life happen and I felt defeated and disappointed in myself. I’d had so much potential and had come so close, but here I was…a nobody with no career, no money, no husband, and no accomplishments that made me feel good about myself. I was grieving my dream life that died with glitter makeup and inflatable furniture. And as grief often goes, the pain faded and made itself comfortable in the junk drawer in my mind.
Then yesterday, out of nowhere, it popped back into my mind…but in a completely new light!
I’ve been stuck in bed a lot the last few days after messing my back somehow in my sleep (I’m getting old!! 😩😭) and the pain killers have been knocking me out. So there I was in my bed, looking out the window at the tree tops and the beautiful blue sky as a nice breeze carried a subtle smell of wood smoke through my window and I thought to myself how happy it made me and I wish I could have every day like that. That’s when it hit me that the things that make me happy are so simple, but really, they’re not much different from what I wanted when I was a kid. I still want those same things, I had just been interpreting them wrong.
I thought I wanted to be rich, but what I really wanted was freedom and a life that isn’t dictated by how much money I have. I thought I wanted fame, but I just wanted the power to help others and to feel like I mattered in this crowded world. I thought I wanted to live in a big house by the ocean, but what I actually wanted was to be in a beautiful environment. I thought I wanted to marry a celebrity, but I just wanted to spend my life with another creative, open minded person that I felt connected to and I could relate to and to feel lucky to have been chosen by someone special. And even though I would still love to be a singer, I really just want to spend my days doing something creative with my talents that I love and enjoy doing rather than wasting my precious life away just trying to get through another day.
My young mind thought that those were the ways to get what my soul was craving, and no wonder when that’s what media and society has led us to believe. You can’t imagine how excited I was when I realized that everything I want for my perfect life is actually something extremely attainable! Even better? I’ve already started and I hadn’t even realized it!!
This is the smallest home I’ve ever lived in, yet it’s my favourite. And it’ll get even smaller once we start living full time in our renovated RV. But I will be free from mortgage payments and monetary restraints and I will spend every day in beautiful places that inspire me and make me wake with a smile. I will always be helping people, whether it just be random acts, through my psychology practice, or by inspiring and supporting others searching for their own happiness. I’ll never stop taking on creative projects. And maybe one day I will choose to share my life with someone, but now I know it doesn’t have to be a romantic partner. It can be a friend, a family member, just someone that gives me the connection I’m looking for. But I’m pretty good on my own too. In fact, I kind of like the freedom that comes with it!
So all of those dreams never really died…I had just misinterpreted them. Maybe more of us should look back at our childhood dreams and try to see the true desires and meaning behind them. Maybe that’s the answer to our happiness.
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