I was always a dreamer. Every small idea was a big idea in disguise, and my youth was fueled by underdeveloped entrepreneurial spirit. When you’re young, it’s easy to plot grand schemes and believe with every fiber of your being that they are achievable. Somewhere along the way, I became mired in the American Dream instead of my own.
Promising long term relationship? Check. A home, two dogs, and a stable above-average income? Check. A big TV, a car loan, loads of crap I don’t need (and maybe didn’t even really want)? Check. The rat race a reality, I spun paycheck to paycheck, meal to meal, taking for granted the things that really mattered to me.
I think this American life is full of tiny concessions, disappointments, and nay-sayers that create a vacuum around us. There is a huge world outside, and there was a time when we all wanted to be a part of it. It is screaming to us, but we are deaf to it in shrinking glass bulbs where everything has a place and a time, but the time is never now.
For me, ForWorld Thinking Founder Eric Roache is the pick tapping at the endless window I’ve built for myself. Instead of flipping through travel magazines longingly, he went somewhere. Instead of dreaming up ways he could some way affect someone’s life, he went and did it – and it changed him for the better. Instead of knowing only one way of life and blindly accepting its values, he discovered himself and dozens of other cultures in some of the truest ways possible. He has challenged me to look up, look out, and open myself again to the experiences that give me passion.
If someone were to ask me today if I’ve escaped the tiny bubble of my daily life, I can’t honestly say that I have. I certainly don’t intend to evangelize Eric or his journey, either. What I can say is that the charcoals of my former dreams are now glowing embers, and every time they are fanned I feel more awake and alive than I have in years. Again, I know I can make a difference.
How this translates to ForWorld Thinking, and what motivates me toward the trials ahead, is that I know so many young people of my generation or younger who carry a flame inside of them. They are brilliant, they are open, they are unexpected, unwritten. If I can take part in kindling that flame, I will feel fulfilled. To spread wildfire among people who want nothing more than to love and be loved, to feel connected to the world around them, to live honestly and accept diversity – this is important work. And the first step is to help them not only see that it is possible, but to help them succeed in their efforts. Volunteers and social entrepreneurs around the globe are exposed to a thousand reasons not to move forward; it is the purpose of ForWorld Thinking, and my greatest hope, that we can show them why they should, and then support them as they realize their dreams.
(Image courtesy of worradmu)
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