Does your dream feel on life support right now?

Do you feel like everyone is seemingly living their dream through every picture they post on Instagram?

Yet here you are, watching your dream search for loose change in the couch so it can buy a one-way bus ticket as far away from you as possible.

I can relate. For years and years my dream felt like a hot mess that no one wanted to touch.

I could write a whole book about every time my dream was lifeless on the floor with seemingly no chance of survival. Well, actually that is kind of what all my books are about.

Failure Upon Failure

For years every publisher and their mom rejected me and my book. Editors kept changing my book. I worked at a call center just to make enough to pay bills while I kept working on my book.

My dream was to encourage other twentysomethings who felt like they were failing, yet in my twenties, I just kept failing.

My dream died, but it wasn’t dead.

My dream was actually turning into something much bigger and more substantial.

All the failure and rejection wasn’t a detour away from my dream, it was the exact pathway to it.

All the failure was pushing my dream further into the ground. I thought it was to its grave. Now I see, it was so my dream could have deep enough roots to grow.

The failure became my message. Working through the pain, and then helping others do the same, became my purpose.

That’s why I encourage people to ask in my new book 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties, “What are my problems and personal pain revealing to me about my purpose?”

Purpose in the Pain

Your failed dreams. Your struggles. Your breaking moments will help others be healed.

If your dream is not working out according to plan, maybe that’s the exact plan after all.

Now, my dream has grown into three published books and speaking to global leaders.

My dream that “died” is now being sold in Target! Both my books 101 Secrets For Your Twenties and 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties!  If that looks like surreal shock on my face in the picture below, it’s because it is.

Now my kids get to walk into one of their favorite stores and see daddy’s dream. Maybe someday they will read it when they feel like their dreams are on life-support.

Now my “dead dream” is speaking hope and encouragement to fellow dreamers who stumble across my book in a Target aisle.

The messages I’ve received from people who have found my book for the first time, read some of it, then find me on social media to let me know how the book is impacting them, all while still standing in Target, is unbelievable and humbling.

All the failure and frustration has become more than worth it.

Maybe your dream is not going to its grave right now. Maybe it’s being planted. The bigger the dream, the larger the impact, the deeper your roots need to go. (click to tweet that)