Tuesday, October 16, 2012

I Want to Be a Mermaid

From "I'm Really a Mermaid" Shop at Etsy

I read a really amazing post yesterday by the inimitable Emilie Wapnick over at Puttylike.com.  In it, she discusses the emphasis of people on discovering your true talents/career/dream, etc.  But she questions whether this is even a good way to go about the whole matter.  By pursuing your career that way, you're trying to find a way to squeeze yourself in some pre-determined hole, not creating a place for yourself based on what you love and are good at.  

I see so. many. articles. (partly because I tend to read articles like this!) about the importance of following your dream, finding your voice, discovering your passion.  But these all imply that this is a singular goal.  What if, maybe, there are many things you're meant to do?  What if you've a dream to be an artist?  Oh, and a graphic designer?  Oh, and good at baking sourdough bread?  Oh, and a mommy? Oh, and... 

One of the things I love about kids is that they absolutely love and are completely obsessed with about, mm, a billion things. My almost-five-year-old niece is completely crazy about cars, horses, pink, art, mermaids, Blue's Clues, etc.  We are like that too, but when it comes to following our 'dream,' we cut off all those things and decide to just be mermaids when we could be mermaids that find Blue's clues in an artistic way on our favorite underwater horse with our pet car.  

We could!  

So, while I find following your dream an essential part of a happy life, how about we follow all our dreams?


6 comments:

  1. This is an awesome post Emma! I totally agree with you! I love exploring new options all the time!

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  2. Perfect! I never thought of it this way. Uniting all of our passions and doing everything. It's like C.S. Lewis said, you're never too old to dream a new dream. I guess we're never too old to do as much as we want.

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  3. Wonderful post!

    In my recent experiences working with kids I find that they're a whole lot smarter than people give them credit for. They say some of the funniest things too.

    Honestly, give a little kid ten minutes of your day and you'll learn something brand new about cars, legos, Disney, what have you!

    Given the amount of times (including today) that I've been called a kid, and reference Peter Pan tons... so yeah. Favourite quote from Walt "You’re dead if you only aim for kids. Adults are only kids grown up, anyway. "

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  4. Wonderful post!!! I love this! It's like in Tangled, where they talking about having more than one dream. Great post!

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  6. Heck yes. I am one of those people who wants to just do EVERYTHING. And why not? I think that people are pretty much conditioned to think and accept that they have only one purpose and can only be good at one thing. That they should train themselves to be a specific cog in the wheel of society, and once they reach a certain stage in their training, it's hard to change into something else. Balderdash, I say. Dream all, do all.

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