I heard a story about a mission group in a very poor section of a foreign country that takes children out once a month on a ‘dream’ day.
It is a simple trip where they go to the beach and the missionaries tell the kids how much they are loved, and how much potential they have, and that there is nothing that they can’t do.
Apparently many of these kids have gone on to productive lives after they left the orphanages, running business, becoming leaders and accomplishing amazing things .
All because once a month they had a ‘dream day’ that helped them see a world better than the one they lived in most of the time.
I often wonder how often we allow ourselves to have ‘dream days’.
Lisa was always good at this when we were going through infertility.
I remember on her 30th birthday, a couple of years after IUIs and GIFT had pretty much failed, I took Lisa on a trip up the coast of New England to follow the changing leaves.
It was an amazing trip through lush apple orchards in Massachusetts, scary evenings in Salem seeing the spot where the witch hangings took place, and then up through New Hampshire, ending up in Maine.
Idiots that we were, we were so obsessed with soaking up the fall air, that I rented a convertible so we could have the top down, but blast the heat so it didn’t get too cold.
The last day of the trip, Lisa went into a baby store.
I went in for a few minutes, but felt too uncomfortable checking any baby stuff out.
I was sure it would send Lisa into an emotional meltdown if someone walked in with a baby, which, of course is exactly what happened.
She didn’t flinch.
In fact, she started buying baby stuff.
That was her dream day.
The picture frame she bought that day hangs in Elliana’s room.
The dream came true.
I know it’s hard to take these leaps of faith when so many things go wrong.
But without dream days, we can easily get caught in the trap of believing that the ‘real world’ only exists within the four walls that we spend the most time–whether that be a bedroom crying, an office brooding, or an RE’s office holding your breath.
If it’s been a while since you let your imagination run wild, or even let it stray close to the base of any mountain of hope, let it off its leash today.
Make it a dream day.