Go After Your Dreams. No More Fu*king Excuses.

We all have dreams, but we talked ourselves out of chasing them at some point. We’ve allowed the social construct of “FOMO” combined with the unsolicited play-it-safe advice from family, friends, and coworkers to influence us into believing we should be satisfied with living inside the perpetual box. We are convinced that striving for anything outside the norm is a fairytale made up by Hollywood or somehow someone on the internet randomly got “lucky.” Our lives are spent watching from the sidelines, making excuses as to why we will never be in the game. Year after year, we settle for a mediocre existence, never daring to explore what we are truly capable of. Based on the pressures of the outside world, we remain small and insignificant.

But yet, in the back of our minds, our dream still lingers. It haunts us as we stare blankly at the computer screen in our cage-like cubicles as we repeat the same mundane routine five days a week. It creeps up on us in the car as we sit in road rage-filled traffic for an hour plus to and from the office. It whispers in our ear Sunday evening as the weekend ends, and we mentally prepare to return to the same rinse and repeat system Monday morning.

The dream that keeps reappearing in our minds and tugging at our souls reminds us that we are meant to do more with our lives. No matter how often we try to ignore and brush it off, it remains planted on our shoulders, waiting for us to take action—prompting us to do something besides use another cliche phrase as to why our dreams will never become a reality. Here we go again with another fucking excuse.

I’m too old.
I’m too young.
I don’t have the time.
I don’t have enough money.
I have a family to support.
I’m not smart enough.
I don’t know the right people.

Stop with the fucking excuses. 

What happened to us?
When did we become self-sabotaging wimps?
When did we allow society to beat our dreams out of us?

Many of us have flat-out given up on being anything more than what we are. We’ve made every excuse in the book as to why we aren’t who we want to be. Settling for the comfort of a “good paying job in the city” with just enough money left over after rent and bills to cop a few fresh fits, some new kicks, hit the club on the weekends, and take one, maybe two trips a year.

That’s it.
That’s all.

It’s like we’re all sculpted into the same cookie-cutter Instagram and family/friend-approved clone. This is why we feel unfulfilled—one of the reasons we deal with depression, anxiety, and burn-out.

We are not being true to ourselves.
We are not who our dreams are calling us to be.

We are too concerned with fitting in than standing out. We are too afraid of making any radical changes to our lives, remaining trapped in an unhealthy cycle. Brainwashing ourselves into thinking this is just the way life is to the point we stay in our comfort zone at the expense of our discomfort.

If we are honest with ourselves, the life we live now is not the one we dreamed of. Quite frankly, we are just existing, not living. Those dreams we had when we were kids are still there. We just keep trying to suppress them with distractions. At one time in our lives, we wanted to do extraordinary things. We dreamed of being singers, dancers, writers, astronauts, architects, photographers, and CEOs. Yet, we find ourselves punching the clock at multiple soul-sucking dead-end jobs, impatiently working our way to retirement.

“Too many of us are not living our dreams because we are living our fears.”

-Legendary motivational speaker Les Brown

It’s never too late for us to live out the life we envisioned for ourselves. I mean, isn’t that the reason we are here in the first place? To live out our dreams and inspire others to do the same?

So why aren’t we choosing to do just that? Life is short, and we only have so much time left on this planet. Why waste it living in fear? Granted, our dreams will not just fall out of the sky and land in our lap. No amount of prayer or wishful thinking is going to be able to make that happen.

But if we start to reinvent ourselves today, make the necessary changes, and begin working on our dreams, I am a firm believer that the universe will do the rest.

But it all starts with us.

Either we get busy chasing our dreams, or we don’t. Regardless, time is going to pass either way. I’d much rather be the person who dared to go after the highest version of myself than be the one who has to live with the regret that I never did anything worthwhile with the life I was given. Living in regret doesn’t sound like much of a life to me, does it to you?

There is no such thing as the right time.
The time is now.
Stop playing small and go after your dreams.
No more fucking excuses.