Years of Longing)

In the last post I shared the recent experience I’ve had of getting a dog, something I wanted ever since I was a child, and the realization that so much of that dream was specific to my childhood and therefore had to be let go as something that could never be fulfilled. This was an interesting experience and it got me thinking about other dreams that I still have.

Probably the most prominent of those dreams is the one for my own career. I’ve often fantasized about being able to start a small business and spending my working hours on projects that I personally care about. My degree in college was Computer Science with an Animation Emphasis. I’ve been able to do a lot with the Computer Science, programming websites and applications for large businesses, but I haven’t really been able to do anything with the Animation Emphasis part. I did try to make a go of it in the Video Game industry when I first graduated from college, but the experience was very distasteful and made me promise to myself that I would only venture back into there on my own terms.

I long to make my own software, my own animation tools, my own gaming engines, my own games. The dream is to be able to subsist entirely off of these personal creative projects, maybe even earn enough to hire another developer or two and build fun things together. I’ve started many projects that I hoped could become my first product, but I’ve always petered out before I had anything that could actually be sold.

Still, I dream of success. I dream of one day making something that’s just good enough. It doesn’t need to be a great hit, it doesn’t have to become famous, but I would want it to be successful enough to quit my 9-to-5 and justify working full-time for myself.

But then, I remember what it was like finally getting the dog I’d always wanted, and that sure didn’t play out as expected. Would it be the same with this?

Inevitable Disappointment)

I’m sure it would be. I cannot think of a single time in my life where I’ve imagined how something would go, and then it was exactly what I’d expected. Serving a mission for my church, going to college, driving a car, getting a job, getting married, having children, owning a home…the list goes on and on. Not a one of these played out how I had envisioned. Some of them were better than expected, some worse, some just different, but never how I thought. Surely it would be the same with my fantasies of starting my own business. Surely not everything would be good about the experience. There would certainly be monotony, tedious paperwork, setbacks, anxiety…yet none of these feature in my fantasies.

The more I fantasize the experience of forging out on my own, the more I set myself up for disappointment. I don’t think that it’s bad for me to have this goal, and I think it genuinely would be good to achieve it, but if I’m too married to a particular image of how it’s supposed to be, I’m likely to receive a good thing and be put off by it still the same.

What I’ve come to realize is that some dreams have to be given up entirely. The timing passes, the opportunity disappears, or there is no assurance it will ever happen. Other dreams can still be retained, but the idea of exactly how they play out must be surrendered. I can have my dreams, but it’s probably best to keep them vague and broad. I can be in love with the idea of owning my own creative business, while leaving the exact manifestation of that open to interpretation.

Having no dreams is a recipe for living a lackluster life. Having too specific of dreams is a recipe for never being satisfied with what you get. Ambition is fine, but let God work out the details, and be happy for what good you do receive, not sullying it by obsessing on what you didn’t.