We have all heard that old saying “If you argue for your limitations, you get to keep them.”  Likewise, if we continue to resist our urges and desires to achieve our goals, we will never get to reach them. By taking one deliberate step at a time, one word at a time, we have the ability to pave the way toward attaining the dreams that began as seedlings in our hearts and minds years ago, when we were young children, innocent and eager.  Along the way, we made a wish upon a star before we climbed into bed at night, or we made a wish against the bright colored candles on our birthday cake each year, yet we failed to take those wishes seriously.  The dreams that lay forgotten inside us were swept off into the wind as we blew out the fires or they lay in shattered pieces, buried deep inside us. Yet, despite all the years that have fled by, through the many challenges that have distracted us, our goals have continued to beckon us.  They won’t let go of us. So….reluctantly we finally look inside ourselves to find those broken pieces of our dreams, the ones that weren’t tossed away, and in time, we see them there, way, way, way down deep, pushed so far down that it is a miracle that we find them at all. Peering harder, we begin to see a distant sparkle, and then gradually a glaring light growing larger, and suddenly that persistent goal becomes clear again.  We remember that we once wanted to become a dancer, a teacher, a doctor, or a published children’s author, but we have not done what it takes to get there.  We have ignored and resisted the urge to write each day because we convinced ourselves that we have no time and no talent. Yet, our goals continue to beckon us. Instead of recognizing that we waste our energy on attaining immediate results at the expense of future payoffs, we continue to muddle aimlessly and stubbornly through the years.

     Ray Bradbury wrote 1,000 words a day when he first recognized that his goal beckoned him. He refused to allow his “present self” to destroy the chances for his “future self” to succeed, so he finally gave in to the perpetual coaxing he had ignored. The small random steps we take each day will eventually lead us in some direction. But, as Yogi Berra once said “If you don’t know where you are going, you’ll end up someplace else”, -someplace you don’t necessarily want to be. And so, it is time finally to recognize that each of our dreams, wishes and goals are unwavering, unrelenting and always beckoning, so perhaps it is time to stop ignoring the allure and instead, begin to take one deliberate step at a time, one word at a time, and write that darn book.