How to Get What You Want by Challenging Assumptions.
Do you have an impossible dream? Anything is achievable. Follow me.
“Sometimes, the thing you want feels impossible to achieve and out of reach. Shift your perspective, change your approach, and you’ll find a path that works for you. That’s when the impossible becomes possible.”
Achieving My Goal. Is It Possible?
Today is an exciting day!
It’s not my birthday.
It’s the 129th running of the Boston Marathon.
I was born and raised in Boston, so the marathon is almost a religious experience for me.
I love the anticipation, enthusiasm, and inspiration surging through participants and spectators each April.
Over the years, I've enjoyed attending the pre-race weekend festivities, including shopping at vendor tents, listening to live music, participating in fun activities, and just being part of the community of local, regional, national, and international fans and professional and amateur runners.
The air is electric. I stand behind the finish line sign painted on the ground in front of the Boston Public Library on Boylston Street. My arms raised as a friend takes the obligatory photo of a simulated marathon finish. A video of me, breathless but exhilarated, crossing the finish line with 30,000 other runners plays in my mind.
I wear my orange New Balance Fresh Foam 860 running shoes, long black nylon leggings, and a Boston Athletic Association jacket that I bought long ago at a clearance price after the 110th Boston Marathon was over.
For decades, I have dreamed about pinning the runner’s bib on my shirt, but I know at 58 years old, the dream is as close to running a marathon as I’m ever going to get.
I took up running once, but a mile was all I could manage before I had to rest.
I watch the world’s major marathons on television and never miss the men’s and women’s Olympic marathons as they cross the starting line every four years.
While my body knows I’m getting older and too out of shape to run a marathon, my mind thinks I’m 25 and the perfect specimen of an amateur runner.
Is it impossible to believe I could still achieve this goal?
Am I delusional?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
How to Get What You Want
Every one of us has a dream or goal that is going unfulfilled.
Maybe you want to:
write a book, but you’ve never written as much as a short story before and don’t know the first place to start.
travel around the world, meet new people, and learn about their culture, but the cost and time involved make it unattainable.
become an artist, but you have no formal training, and no gallery will represent you.
go back to school, but the time commitment is impractical.
So, how can we get what we want? Do we have to live the rest of our lives with these dreams deep inside us that go unfulfilled?
No, we have to flip them on their head by challenging our assumptions. We have to change the premise.
Anything is possible.
Maybe you can’t fathom writing a 300-page book, but you can carve out time each day to write one page. In less than a year, you'll have a 300-page manuscript.
Maybe instead of traveling around the world, you can read books set in different countries and connect with immigrants who live in your community enthusiastic to share their language, culture, food, and personal experiences with you.
You may not be a formally trained artist, but you can take a local art class or connect with other amateur artists through a Meetup group to paint together outside as part of a plein-air painting community.
Maybe you don’t have the time or money to get a formal college degree, but free online classes and community workshops on subjects you are passionate about can feed your need for learning.
Getting What I Want
As for me, I’m flipping the script and challenging assumptions about my marathon dreams.
A marathon is 26.2 miles. That’s a fact.
But who says I have to run? Why can’t I walk?
Who says I have to complete it all in one day? Why can’t I complete it over several days?
You may be saying, “Well, walking 5 miles for three days and 3 miles for four days is not really finishing a marathon, even though you have actually exceeded the miles a marathon covers.”
Who says?
Why do I have to confine myself to the dictates of the professional requirements? I’m not a professional athlete, so I can do it my way, in my time. The way that works for me.
It’s time you and I reexamine the concept of something being impossible.
Anything is possible if you look at it differently.
