The Necessary Absurdity of A Dream Life
Time to audacity-maxx.
Our literal dreams are ridiculous! I vividly remember a dream where I was flying a plane in the shape of a turtle in Bikini Bottom with my best friend. It's a universally acknowledged truth: in the depths of slumber, our minds wander through uncharted and unfamiliar terrain. Sometimes, yes those dreams have the plot of a porno and the writing of a Tyler Perry movie, but they are not meant to fit neatly into our present reality. Yet, when it comes to our "dream lives," we tend to rein in our imaginations, opting for the measured and practical. Even as a staunchly delusional person, I still find myself tempering my expectations when crafting my “dream life” There is a terrible irony that if we were given three magic wishes, many of us would give banal, and unoriginal answers. It seems as though even if a situation without the limitation placed on us, we do not have the courage to demand our dream life.
I would do either or both of them. Yes, these are two different people.
This conversation about the necessity for an audacious dream life happened after a recent personal revelation. There is this formula1 driver who I would dick-ride, suck his toes, and do a lot of things that I would get this substack banned. However, before I could come up with our imaginary future with half African-Spanish kids living in a Cateau with him retiring full-time to take care of our daughter, I immediately needed to protect myself from my self-imposed rejection by saying that he would never be into me. For some reason, him being a popular millionaire Formula One driver and me being a nobody was not the enemy of our great romance. In fact, that part was a necessary plot device. It was the fact that in my reality, even if we were in the same room, locked eyes, talked, and had the setup for a perfect romantic comedy, there is a certain type of woman that he is attracted to, and I am not that woman.
Then it hit me: I had created another self-imposed boundary on the dynamic, ever-folding narrative that is my life. It wasn't about convincing a millionaire athlete to love me; it was about recognizing that I was subconsciously excluding myself from certain storylines. Even when I was the author, I deemed my character unworthy. I had forgotten that I am here to live a remarkable, once-in-a-lifetime life, not a predictable, self-limiting one. It is also about how many of us give up on “dreams.” How many of our vision boards are plastered with images of goals that are actually practical because we are too afraid of what our actual dreams are? How many of our fantasies are safely tucked away in the crevices of our psyche, lest they rear their ugly heads into our thoughts and, worse yet, our actions? How many of us have denied ourselves of our grander ambitions and robbed the giant in us of a chance at victory?
This essay is a call to action to dream-maxx. Create that vision board as lucid and This essay is a call to action to dream-max. Create that vision board as lucid and absurd as the dreams we have in our sleep. Take that modest apartment and replace it with an even greater apartment. Come up with a story as absurd as those in Sex and the City and Friends for how you can afford this apartment. Put up that picture of that ridiculous vacation. Yes, the one you never thought you could afford. But somehow, the great author of your life came up with a plot twist that landed you the vacation of your dreams. Write that epic love story where the man is willing to die on the sword for you. Where his dedication to you challenges those of Napoleon to Josephine or Edward to Wallis Simpson. The divine author has already written multiple great love stories like this; why would your character not get one?
It is also a call to vision-maxx because, counterintuitively, those dreams are easier to achieve because fewer people are attempting them, but also because you do not know what you’re fully capable of or how life could dramatically surprise you. Ambition-maxx, dream-maxx. Live your life in such a way that necessitates miracles. Take bold, audacious action, and inspire the giant in you.
Best,
Coffy.
No One Told Me
No one told me that love was meant to be easy: That it was the man’s job to pursue me. That love was not a circus where I had to constantly perform for a man’s approval. No one told me how to be beautiful. I don’t mean beauty in a way that makes me contort myself to the latest beauty trend or try to recreate beauty ideals that I was never going to achieve. I meant a beauty that accentuated my features. A beauty that unveiled the most authentic version of myself. A version that neither I nor the world had witnessed yet.
You are enough for your dreams
This week, I have had a ministration (I hate that I have to use this word, it is the West African in me). It was that we were enough for their dreams. One of the most perverse things about the self-improvement culture is the idea that you must be qualified for your dreams. You must continually mold yourself to become the hero deserving of the adventure that is your life. This is a lie, and a particularly insidious one for women, who are constantly bombarded with messages about needing to change, fix, or upgrade themselves. The irrefutable truth is that you, the hero, are sufficient when they are presented with their journey.