Catalyst Track: Stop Thieves from Stealing Your Dream // Day Three

We can’t just wish away thieves from stealing our dreams. We must be proactive.

Do you have a dream you feel like is hanging in the balance? Or maybe you feel like it’s just gone. Either way, where do you go from here?

In this 3-day track from the Catalyst App, Philip Wagner, author of Unlock Your Dream, shares three ways to “stop dream thieves in their tracks.”

Whether you are currently experiencing a disappointed dream or you know a friend or someone you lead who is, you can recover and keep your capacity to dream alive!

Are you ready? 

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DAY 3: Keep Your Passion Alive

 

Limitations are everywhere and can feel relentless. As we pursue our dreams, we ask ourselves, Is this a fantasy I’m trying to make a reality, or is it actually possible? If it is possible, do I have what it takes? Am I good enough? Will I fail? Am I a valuable person without any accomplishments? If people look closely enough, will they see that I am not enough? These are the questions that insecurity poses to us.

 

A dream stealer enters our pursuits when what is actually possible is cam­ouflaged among the real impossibilities we encounter. When we see what looks to be impossible, we often not only begin to doubt the possibilities, but we also begin to doubt our ability. And we must cling to our focused passion to keep this thief from stealing our dreams.

 

George Dantzig understood that kind of passion. While enrolled in the mathematics doctoral program at the University of California, Berkeley, he arrived late to one of his classes. He saw two statistical problems written on the blackboard and assumed them to be a homework assignment.

 

He went home and worked to solve both. When he turned in the assign­ment late, he apologized to his professor, saying that “the problems seemed harder to do than usual.” What Dantzig hadn’t realized was that both of the statistical problems on the board had been two famous unsolved problems. But Dantzig did not know the problems were unsolvable, so he solved them. He went on to become a mathematical scientist and professor who won many awards for his work. I believe it was his passion that allowed him not to give up.

 

We always need to recognize, reject, and overcome those thieves that try to make our self-talk negative. Dreamers who reach their goal do it because they’ve locked up thieves who have tried to make them victims. You and I are not victims! God didn’t make any mistakes when He planted those dreams within us.

 

In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:37–39, NIV)