Dreams and expectations

They say it's good to have dreams.

That's true, you have to know which direction to head in if you're going to find the light at the end of the tunnel.

But do some dreams just end up weighing you down as you get older?

When you're young, the whole world is your oyster and dreams can be as ambitious as you like. Ask a group of kids what they want to be when they're older and you'll inevitably hear things like: "An astronaut", "A doctor", "A fireman", "A singer".

Kids' dreams aren't limited by the reality of skills, education and money.

As you get older and you find more realistic dreams, does it get any easier?

It seems, the more you focus on a dream and the more you tell other people about those dreams, the more they become expectations. A line drawn in the sand that you'll obviously reach one day if you just keep on walking. But what if you don't? Were you dreaming too high or expecting too much?

The size of your dreams aren't equal to the size of the expectations on you.

The celebrity minority in our society are often heard to say that they dreamed of being famous, of winning that championship or medal, of being the best in their field. And those big dreams and ambitions helped to motivate them to get there. 

But no one expects them to make it so big.

So what about us civilians? Those of us who may have dreamed of something small but ambitious and, on the face of it, fairly achievable. The smaller the dream, the bigger the expectation that you'll achieve it. And expectation is pressure: a simple dream should be easy to achieve. And if you don't, that carries a big weight of failure.

So should we dream big or small? Should we keep dreams as dreams and never expect to achieve them?

Should we aim for the large tunnel with the big light or the little tunnel with the small light?

Maybe we should just enjoy the journey…