Dying Before My Time

So the other day I was doing one of those *increasingly infrequent* things called an MSN chat, and my friend said something significant:

"I've stopped dreaming about that for some time already."

I guess I should have been happy for him. Maybe he was honestly losing touch with the real world and needed that reality check. Maybe the dream was consuming him to the point of obssession. Maybe he was the better off for setting his sights on something achievable.

But all I know was that I felt sad. Because, if you think about it, there's nothing sadder than losing the thrill of anticipation.

I shall always remember the scene in "Million Dollar Baby" where Hillary Swank, playing Maggie, practises her boxing late at night, all alone in a deserted gym. And I shall also remember the scene with her counting her hard-earned pennies from her thankless job as a waitress to buy the boxing bag she really wanted. Now there are obviously things I disagree with in the movie, but to me, it is the defining movie about living a dream.

You see, dreams are meant to be that way. They are meant to keep us awake at night, imagining what life would be like if they came true.They are meant to nag at us in the back of our heads when we're doing the things we don't really want to do, in the journey to getting where we are doing what we really want to do. They are meant to be larger than life, bigger than ourselves, belonging to another realm and space.

Something dies inside of us each time we deny those dreams. Life is harsh enough and soul-sapping enough that sometimes, dreams become more than just a pleasant escape into fantasyland.... they become our lifelines, the stuff that convinces us that life is about more than just what we see and touch and feel. They keep us going when circumstances get so bad that we just feel like sitting down for a good cry, they keep us cheerful when nothing around us gives us any reason to hope, they keep us optimistic when there is nothing else to live for.

The reason why we need to dream is because killing the dream kills the belief that things can and will get better if we persevere long enough. And the reason why all of us without exception feel inspired by stories of dreamers who had their dreams come true is because we all secretly hope that our own dreams, even the crazy impossible laughable ones, may someday come true as well.

There is a tiredness about people who have stopped dreaming. I've talked to them, and I know there's more to it than just busy-ness or the mundanity of life. I've been there myself, so I know how it feels. All of life is a shade of grey, and one is just pulling oneself through each day, living to pass the time, directionless and drifting. Nothing excites you anymore, nothing quickens your heartbeat, nothing fills your thoughts and heart. One can be living and breathing and talking and laughing, and yet be dead on the inside with a deadness of spirit that is worse than actually lying six feet under.

I don't want to live that way. I think, for me, I need to know that the life I now have isn't my best shot at happiness, and there is something better waiting for me around every corner. I need to know perfect joy and complete satisfaction is someday possible. (which is mainly why I am a Christian and not something else, because if planet Earth is as good as it gets, I may as well totally give up.) I need to know that even if I never get what I really truly want, it won't be for want of trying.

"Tell me what you dream of, and I shall know who you really are..."

Because there's a dimension to me and you that is beyond the things we do to be productive or kill time. And in that dimension of the soul, in that place where dreams are made or broken, in that other identity we guard with fear and shame-

Some live.

And others die.