Perchance to dream?

Sometimes life can be a massive bitch and you are thwarted at every turn. Everything goes wrong. Nothing you want to happen happens. Everything you don't want to happen does.

And then sometimes life isn't like that. Things go right. Life isn't a bitch, it's a fairy godmother with a magic wand and she just can't do enough for you.

At the moment, I feel like I'm in a things going right phase. It's really nice. I just wanted to note it. To notice it, in the parlance of mindfulness.

Sometimes, your dreams can come true. Like Madonna said: "I had a dream. I wanted to be a big star. I didn’t know anybody. I wanted to dance. I wanted to sing. I wanted to do all those things. I wanted to make people happy. I wanted to be famous. I wanted everybody to love me. I wanted to be a star. I worked really hard and my dream came true."

My dream isn't to be a star, or to dance or to sing. (Well maybe the latter, a little bit, deep down inside. But then isn't that everyone's dream? Isn't that why X Factor works? :-))

I have lots of dreams. I would like to get my book published. I would like to be happy. I would like to be loved. These are big dreams. And two out of three isn't bad. Working on the third.

Smaller dreams come in all sorts of flavours. And they are surprisingly easy to make come true. This is what I am realising. You just have to say it out loud. This is my new theory. Ask for what you want. Don't be afraid.

My daughter and I have sat and dreamed about getting on a train and travelling to Venice. We've sat and talked about it. We've said to each other "wouldn't it be nice?" We have imagined the feeling of arriving. We have looked at pictures and sighed. But we never really thought it would happen, because, well, there are so many other things that have to come first. So much real life where dreams don't have a place.

Last week I had a bit of a moment. I realised I was teaching my daughter to believe that you can't make your dreams come true. That dreams are only that. Imagination. Not to be realised.

So I said the dream out loud. I asked: can we do this? And the answer? YES. Why not? So now we're going to Venice. On a train. We'll get on the train in France and wake up in Venice. I had the power to make my daughter's dream come true and it feels amazing. Even more amazing to realise that I had the power to make my own dream come true too.

IMAGE: Ezioman http://www.flickr.com/photos/ezioman/2538574836/in/photostream/