I was checking out this really sweet site this morning (www.therubybooks.org) when I had a thought that maybe you have had at some point:  what AM I doing with my life?  I have these really big dreams.  Some people call them plans.  I keep thinking that I’m working towards fulfilling them.  I make schedules and write myself lists and notes.  I get very little checked off and so my dreams continue to loom large and distant.

This thought eats away at me, that I may never realize my dreams.  Why have them then?  A friend had a huge health crisis last night and when I couldn’t physically be there for her (an entire country lies between us, sadly) and I thought about what my life would be like without her in it, I had to do some big rewrites to my plans!  As my friend faced her own fears about mortality and poor health she had an epiphany:  “I feel changed by this.  I feel so vulnerable.  Life is such a privilege… breathing…”  The truth is that John Lennon knew what he was talking about when he sang, “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”  Who knows what each day will hold for us?  Who knows if we will struggle to breathe today?  Who knows if tragedy is just around the corner? What we have is this moment right now to actually make dreams and plans happen.  What can I do in this moment, now?

Which brings me back to the Ruby Books site…her character, Jeanne, asks herself to reexamine her dreams.  Perhaps, she ponders, they are not too big “just misunderstood.”  Yes, my dream is to teach peace through global sensitivity.  I also have a dream to see thinkpeace girls actively working to be the change they wish to see in the world while being supported by our girl community.  I have a dream that one day soon we’ll bring boys into the picture to advocate for girls worldwide.  I have a dream that all girls will be counted, valued, safe, and heard.  Actually that’s a dream I have for humanity.  Without looking at the big, giant, overwhelming global picture in my dreams, I can look around me and see manifestations of the issues all around me.  I can start here.  Right here.

Life IS a privilege!  And so, instead of dreaming, I’m going to live my life.  I’m listening to what my life is saying to me, to let my dreams BREATHE.  One breath at a time.  Yes, it will make me vulnerable but opening my heart wider is part of the thinkpeace dream!  Here I go…