I was on hold with my local clinic about my big toe – which stubbornly is not healing*—when I realized I was hearing a Dan Fogelberg song from my youth. In fact, the song coming over the phone had been the soundtrack for my 16th summer, a time when I was bursting with hopeful itchy angst, stuck between yearning for newness, for life, to be in life yet completely unsure what I wanted from life. As I listened to Dan croon (what a crush I had on him: the original sensitive man!) it struck me that how I felt my Pu16th summer was very similar to how I felt now, some 29 years later, and that Dan’s question was perfect for me – and maybe for you, too. Where do you go when you get to the end of your dreams? (I realize now the station was playing Dan because he died Monday of cancer at 56.)

I’ve run out of dreams. It’s very scary to admit that because in this microcosm culture of personal growth and coaching where I spend a lot of my time, it’s all about possibilities. Declaring, “Hey, I’m tired of growth. I don’t want to live my best life. I just want to curl up and do nothing,” feels so unrealized. It also smacks of the S word-selfish. “Dreams are the food of the soul. In our existence, we often see dreams come undone, yet it is necessary to go on dreaming, otherwise the soul dies and agape does not penetrate it” rhapsodizes novelist Paulo Coelho in his Ode magazine column (January/February 2008). Yes, I say to Paul yes but where does the letting go, cleaning out, dropping-into-nothingness-stage of dreaming fit? In our love affair with self-improvement and efficiency, have we forgotten this aspect? If you and I don’t attend to not dreaming, do we block the ability to conjure truly new dreams? If I lack the courage to peer at my dreams and ask hard questions like:

• What commitment am I willing to make?
• What price am I willing to pay?
• What courage is required of me right now?

(Questions courtesy of The Answer to How is Yes by Peter Block)

What is the result? If I lack the stamina to be restfully fallow (say that three times really fast), do my dreams cease being dreams and become should-filled bland heavy nightmares? If I only dream, do my dreams become only delusions?

I believe many of us have gotten to the end of our dreams—I certainly think our American culture has reached the end of something. Partially this may be because we have relentlessly, brutally pushed ourselves. Faster, faster, grab the golden ring! Keep moving, keep buying, keep trying because if you don’t, you’ll be left behind. Our collective well has more than run dry; we’ve pushed clear through to China and out into empty space. Consider our political landscape, our national depression rate, and the number of horror movies leering from the New Movie wall at the video store* as proof positive. We want to dream radical raw dreams, we want to feel desire, we want to believe in new beginnings but we’re too tired from doing, from pushing, and those optimists among us, from dreaming.

Stay tuned for Part 2…