Welcome to Dream.Learn.Discover. This blog is about seeing the good in the world. With all the bad, evil and destruction, there are many, many people who are creating good in their sphere of influence. Some of these spheres are large and some are small.
“I wish it need not have happened in my time,’ said Frodo.
“So do I,’ said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.’
J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
It is with this time some decide to do remarkable things, though they may not believe them to be remarkable at the time.
James Allen said, “Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so shall you become.’ Dreams are an integral part of who we are and what we become. Without dreams, life becomes a drudgery.
I learned this some time ago when I had dinner with an old acquaintance. Thought the years had somehow continued to flow past since we last had spoken, I looked forward with great anticipation to the meeting. In younger years we had been close friends, and had shared many adventures and had looked forward to the open horizon of the future. How had he fared? To my disappointment, I found him somehow changed. The constant light of excitement had deadened in his eyes and he seemed somehow lost. It wasn’t until later I realized what had happened.
He had lost his dreams.
Somehow, between childhood and adulthood, they had been stolen, lost or destroyed. Without them he was adrift.
“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?’
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,’ said the Cat.
“I don’t much care where –’ said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,’ said the Cat.
“– so long as I get somewhere,’ Alice added as an explanation.
“Oh, you’re sure to do that,’ said the Cat, “if you only walk long enough.’
Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
Dreams spring from somewhere inside of us, especially when we are young. Children are a fountain of dreams and expectations. Limits have yet to be placed on their mind, and so they dream big.
I once had a professor at university who was rather dismissive at my desire to know and learn everything within my chosen field, and maybe in some ways he may have been right. The field of study was very broad with many, many different sub-topics, all of which were constantly changing. For one with a deep specialization keeping up could be challenging in that limited scope. However, there is a part inside of me that kicks against the idea of heavy specialization to the exclusion or near-exclusion of all others. There are so many things to learn.
Education is far more than what one learns in school, and one should be in a continual state of “continuing education’ or continual learning. Somewhere along the line many of us somehow seem to lose the intellectual curiosity that prompts the child to continue to ask “why?’ We begin to accept things as just being the way they are without a desire to know why they are they way they are. Why is the sky blue? Why is the ocean blue, but my glass of water isn’t? How does a radio work? What causes concrete to harden? Perhaps we know the answers; perhaps we don’t. Do we care? But, a child always wants to know.
And finally there is discovery. Discovery is learning something new, whether it is new to the whole world or just to us. It’s that wonderful moment when the world seems to once again open up, and one feels understanding and view broaden and deepen. Sometimes this comes through something someone says and at the other times through study. There is the carefully worked out bit of logic and the flash of inspiration. Regardless, it is a grand moment.
Again, as one grows older, the number of new and unique experiences can diminish. The normal, every day life seems to wear the same suit day-in and day-out. The days blur together into weeks, and then into months, and then years. It is not so for a child, where every day is full of the new and novel. Sometimes it is small, but even the small things are important.
So, what’s this all about? It’s about dreaming, learning and discovering. It’s about the good and wonderful things in the world that inspire. In some ways, it’s about trying to be more like children–child-like not childish. It’s about believing. It’s about doing, for “men are, that they might have joy’.
~ Trev Harmon