Every one of us needs to think big and to have a realm of fantasy. This happens all the time when you are watching a movie or reading a book.

You are looking at life and you are not speaking to anybody. You are drawing into yourself and you begin to go over things in your mind. And especially when you begin to think about the future you begin to dream.

I am not talking about dreaming like you do when you are asleep. I am talking about live dreams.

What I am talking about here is day-dreaming. This is where you are visualizing things, looking to the future and imagining things. You are trying to paint a picture and seeing yourself in that picture.

If you are a normal human being you will have times of daydreaming and visualizing of the future. There will be times when you will think to yourself,

"How wonderful it would be if.."

That can happen when you are watching a movie, and you wish you could take that movie and put yourself right inside there. Your dream may begin to go that way and you may think,

"I wish I could be like the hero of that movie. I wish I could have the kind of life he lives and make the amount of money he earns. I also wish I could travel."

Every one of us at one stage or another has some kind of dream or fantasy about the future. And each of us has some kind of idea of what we expect will happen in our lives.

I want to ask you a simple question now.

Have you fulfilled your dreams - those wonderful fantasies that you lie awake at night thinking about?

Are you there yet? When do you expect to get there? Do you ever expect to get there?

Introduction to Goal Setting

I remember some years ago when I first discovered some tapes by Jim Rohn called 'Adventures in Achievement'. He had a nice little workbook with it about goal setting. He said,

"You must sit down and look at your goals. Then consider how you could see yourself 5, 10 or 20 years from now."

He got you to look at your own personal character, your capabilities and your finances. It was a very comprehensive little workbook. So I sat down and faithfully filled them all in as to what I could see myself being and accomplishing in the future.

Time went on, and many years later we discovered these workbooks lying amongst the junk when we moved.

It was fun to pick them up and see what I had written. Some of the kids picked them up and had a look at the goals that I had written out so nicely and in such detail.

It was amazing, but it sounded as though I only wrote those goals out the previous week. I was still in about the same place then as what I was when I first wrote them.

My life really had not changed. My financial situation was about the same as what it always was. And my capabilities and weaknesses were about what they always were. I just had not progressed.

Why was this? According to the principles that Jim Rohn taught, if you could set goals you would succeed. You could get out there and accomplish.

Well I set the goals, but many years later those goals hadn't changed and neither had my life. Something was wrong. I was confused.

Dreams and Goals Not the Same

In recent times I have realized some things. I have taught about applying the principles that bring success, and about beginning to birth some of the things we desire using the power of the spirit within us. I also taught that we should start with something small.

In the past I always believed that the bigger your vision was the better. I thought if you aimed for the moon and just hit the ceiling, well at least it was further than where you were right now.

I figured if you aimed further and then didn't quite make it, at least you got somewhere. That was always my logic. A lot of people seem to think that way and they say,

"Don't just say I would like $1 000. Say I'd like $10 000. Then if you just make $1 000 that's great, but at least you were aiming further."

I thought, "If we make $10 000 that would be nice. If we make $5 000 it would also be great. But I'm not complaining about making $1 000 either. If I aimed for $1 000, I might only have made $200."

That was my logic. The problem was that I was confusing dreams and goals which is what everybody seems to do. So in this Section I want to try and make it very clear what is the difference between a dream and vision and the setting of goals.

They are not the same. They are totally different. And unless you can grasp this, you may spend the rest of your life waiting for your dream to be fulfilled and find out that it never takes place.

Later on you get to the age where you realize that your time is over. You are not young any more, you're getting old and are heading for retirement now. There are only so many years left in your life and you still haven't accomplished your goals. Then you say,

"I might as well give up that dream because it's never going to happen."

Dream Big and Use Fantasy

We all need a dream. Martin Luther made a famous speech where he said,

"I have a dream."

People have taught this and exalted his great speech about having a dream. But he never fulfilled his dream because he was shot.

It requires more than having a dream. Every one of us has a dream, and dreams are essential. Without them you will never accomplish anything in this life. Dreams are the only things that have the power to inspire you and motivate you.

Dreams must be as big as possible. They must even be huge. They must be magnificent, and go into and stay in the realm of fantasy. If they are not like that they are not dreams; they are simply reality.

Reality doesn't inspire, because you look around you and you see that your life is nothing to get excited about. So you have to get excited about what isn't there. You have to get excited about what lies in the realm of fantasy.

That is why even as children, we loved the fairy stories. We loved reading the fantasy stories and the magic stories - as demonic as what they were.

We just love the realm of fantasy. I know I love to watch movies like Superman and all the great superheroes, and things that are outside of the realm of the normal. I think,

"Wow, wouldn't it be awesome to be like that?"

One of the best dreams I ever had was one where I was flying like Superman over the earth. I was able to dive and go wherever I wanted. It was a wonderful feeling; a real dream.

That one will never be a reality, but what an exciting thing to think about. What an exciting feeling to be free like a bird and to be able to fly; to have magnificent powers like some of the great superheroes have in those comic books. These all lie in the realm of fantasy.

We all want a life that is free of stress, free of problems and difficulties. We all dream of a day when life will be easy and there will be no pressure.

Well that fantasy will ultimately be fulfilled one day in the Heavenly realm. But on this earth there is a limit to what we can achieve. And so we need to move out of the realm of fantasy and into reality.

There are a lot of things that you can dream about that are entirely possible in this world.

You may see someone else living the kind of life you would like to live. When you see this, it is possible for you to dream of having that same life because it was possible for them.

It doesn't lie in the realm of the supernatural or the realm of impossibility. It is entirely possible. There are people living lives like that now, so why are you not?

So your dreams are built around every desire. All of us have different desires don't we?

Different Desires

You know having great wealth isn't necessarily everybody's dream. In fact having wealth is never a goal that anyone aims for.

It is the things that the wealth can give you that you aim for. It is the kind of life that you can live because you have that wealth. That is really what you desire. You desire a place of freedom.

Different people have different desires. Some people may have a desire to be in control; to be high up and in charge of many other people. That is a foolish desire. If you start having to take care of a whole lot of other people it will just bring you more stresses.

We have the fantasy that to be the boss and the big CEO at the top makes things so much easier. You don't realize the responsibility that goes with it, but that is beside the point. If that is your desire then you need to dream about it.

Dreams are Always Future

The operative word in dreams is the word 'want'. A dream is always future and it has no time frame in it. A typical statement you might make based on your dreams is something like this,

"One day I would like to do this (whatever your dream is)."

Isn't that what dreams are like?

You say, "One day my ship will come in. One day I will rise up and be like a queen (or a king)."

"One day I will drive in limousines and fly in my own private jet."

"One day I will do this."

It always has a future orientation and it has no time frame. In the end it is really just a fantasy and a hope, but in your mind you are thinking,

"It is way beyond my reach. I don't know if I will ever have it. I would love to have it but perhaps it will happen one day."

Dreams Motivate You

Perhaps you start out with those kinds of dreams and you are still very young. If so you have so many years in your life for good fortune to shine on you.

Maybe as the world puts it, good luck will come your way. And maybe, by some pure accident and if it's your lot in life, you might just make it and fulfill that dream. But it is somewhere out there in your vague future fantasies.

You might say, "Perhaps one day I will be a millionaire or a billionaire. Perhaps one day I'll just cruise around the world on my own ship."

Everyone has their own fantasies and dreams. And sometimes they have more than one of them.

But dreams do not have the power to change your life. They only keep you motivated and headed towards the future. You live in the hope that maybe one day you will fulfill your dream.

That is why your dream must be big and why it must be filled with emotion. That is why your dream must be exciting. It must be something that really thrills you, that drives you and keeps you going and says,

"Wow I would love to do that with my life!"

Your Past Dreams

Look back on your life and where you stand right now. Think back on what you dreamed of when you were a young child, if you can think back that far. What kind of dreams and visions did you have for the future?

Then as you grew up and you reached that adolescent age, what dreams did you have for the future? And if you are a bit older like me and you have reached middle age, you were likely married, and had settled down and had a family.

What were your dreams for the future? Think about it then think about where you are right now. Can you honestly say that you are living the life you dreamed of?

Or are you standing at the end now, knowing that you only have so many years left? You are already on the downhill run, and you have still not come close to attaining the things that you dreamed about.

What about the people who did achieve those things?

Do you know someone right now, who perhaps was at the same place you were when you started out, but today they are fulfilling their dreams? Today they are living the kind of life that you dreamed of because they made it.

Look at the people you grew up with and went to school with. When you look at them now, how many of them can you see who rose up and became successful? They became great leaders of big companies; wealthy or influential men or women.

How many people do you know back then that have risen up and you didn't? What made the difference?

You might say, "Well I guess they were just lucky."

No they weren't lucky. They went beyond their dreams. And if you don't go beyond your dreams you will sit there for the rest of your life and you will die still dreaming.

It will only ever be a dream. It will never become a reality in your life because you have to go beyond dreams. You have to come out of the realm of fantasy and into the realm of reality before your dreams can ever be fulfilled.

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