Week Thirteen – Keep on dreaming!

I often say to people “Dreams are our realities of tomorrow” because dreaming is just another way of visualising the future!

Last we I talked about the importance of never giving up and somehow it seems that people made a connection to never giving up on our dreams. A friend of mine after reading my blog wrote to me “I feel it is the moment to move on and try to make my dreams come true :-)” and I began to think what she was trying to say with this. Throughout the years people have been saying “dreams come true” and we all grow up believing this. Our early childhood memories remind us of how we were influenced by the magic of creators like Walt Disney, who still influencing millions of children around the world in believing that dreams can come true.

This magic somehow starts to fade away by realities of life as we grow and move away from being children who enjoy the concept of a Magical World full of dreams to then become teenagers struggling for survival and a place in society where there is no room for dreamers. We move even further away from our dreams when we go to college or University and we start to face the difficulties of adulthood. And then reality hits, we have to find a job, earn money and sooner or latter we join the cycle of society in a job that pays the rent and gives us a bit of extra cash to have a drink. I guess is what you may call “the circle of life” and we struggle to survive in it.

So how did we go from chasing dreams to chasing busses to get to work? Where did it all go wrong for the majority of us? Why did we stop believing that dreams can come true? Why are our realities of today nothing to do with our dreams of yesterday?

I took this idea of “dreams can come true” and spend the next few days observing people (my favourite pastime). After reading my friends comment I began to look for clues as to why people believe that dreams can come true or anyone “living the dream”. I began looking at my own family; my son wants to be a Basketball player. This is his dream! He spends most of his time thinking about being a Basketball player. You may recall in an earlier blog I described how he imagined the O2 Arena in London being a huge Basketball court and he saw himself playing there. He is a good example of how someone young “dreams” of his future. And this to me is clear evidence that dreams are just the realities of our future.

However, for dreams to turn into reality we must work hard to make them come true. I guess this is the part that Walt Disney didn’t share with us; this is the part that many of us will face and will stop us from making our dreams come true. So in order to make sure my son becomes a Basketball Player, he must work hard to make this happen. Now if you don’t live in the US and instead you reside in a small seaside town in the UK, you are going to struggle to find a basketball club! This is the first obstacle he needs to face in his path to achieve his dream. We did find one and finally I took him last weekend for a trial. It is going to be hard work as Basketball is not a popular sport in England and it will be harder to get there. So he needs to focus to make sure this “hard work” does not stop him from making that future reality coming true.

Like my son, I came across other examples. My daughter wants to be a signer, and unlike her brother, being a singer is more accessible than Basketball! However, just like every other dream, there is “hard work” here too! There is tremendous competition in this profession, which can push someone to giving up on his or her dream. She must work hard too in order to compete against thousands of excellent singers out there; she needs to want it more than someone else.

And even as adults we need to work hard to make our dreams come true. My wife has just completed an introduction course in design. She loves decorating houses and for years has been practising with our homes! She has a dream, a reality she can make true, but again, it will be hard work, some of which she has already experienced in the last 10 weeks! As she attended her class she remained a full time mother (with a husband who travels all the time) a part time worker and taxi service for the kids! But she did it! She began to make that dream come true.

Throughout the week I also came across people talking about dreams not coming true, things they want to achieve but couldn’t; realities that seem so far away. And the more I looked the more I saw many of us not only give up on our dreams but stop believing that they could come true!

I have always dreamed of being a writer, ever since I was a kid. I also wanted to be an actor, singer, dancer, you name it, I wanted to be them all! I had some many dreams I think this is why I was so bad at school; I could not deal with my reality back then which was contradicting my dreams of one day being in the world of the performing arts. And it is not just light headed young kids like me with dreams of fame who have a conflict with their present realities, it is anyone’s dreams of either being rich, powerful, famous or just simply a great scientist, doctor or lawyer, any dream that fits our personality and desires is a dream we want to make true, and a reality we need to fight for. I don’t get worried if my kid is not good at school, for me it is more important that he or she has a dream, has formulated a future reality they want to live, it is then our job as parents to support that young mind to shape his or her future with what they dream of today.

It doesn’t matter how old you are, at 47 years of age I still have dreams, and every day that goes by I work hard to make those dreams my reality of tomorrow.

The key is never to give up and not to be frightened of failure, keep going, work hard, remember this is where it breaks down, and one day, for sure, your dream will come true!

Week Twelve – Don’t give up on Lent!

It was last Sunday morning when I heard our priest say “Don’t give up on Lent” as I sat on the third row of our church listening to his sermon.

Finger licking good!

 And no truer words could have come my way that day! I don’t usually attend church on Sundays, I’ve never been a devoted catholic, like my mother was, and I think it was her devotion and years of having to be subjected to attend every Sunday that drove me away from the church. However, I remain connected to the faith through my wife and children and I try to support them as much as I can with this. And after my week of being in hospital and having suffered a relapse in my routine life, I thought I would accompany them and sit there listening to mass and the Sunday sermon, which I often enjoy at Christmas (the one time a year I go to church) because of the interesting messages behind it.

This is not a religious blog so please don’t stop reading; and before I talk to you about why I chose the statement “Don’t give up on Lent” for this week’s blog, let me give you some background information which will help you make the connection.

For those of you who are not catholic or are like me not sure what Lent means, as far as I understand this is the period in which people are asked to give something up for Jesus who suffered for us. At a catholic school, which my kids go to, they teach children the principles of this event and the moral meaning behind it. I also think it is an interesting period which teaches them to understand self control and will power as well as honesty and integrity to keep your promises. In other words, if you say you will do something you stick to it (albeit for Jesus), and don’t lie or cheat and use your self-endurance to get through it! Not a bad learning period for the formation of a young person. We have been doing “giving something up for Lent” in our household for a few years now and every year as a family each of us chose something to give up and we support each other through this period. It is worth mentioning here that it is a total of 40 days where you scarify this pleasure. Also whatever it is that you give up, has got to be something which is important or especial on your life, something you really like and normally can’t do without (otherwise there’s no point!, you’ve got to suffer for it). For those devoted Catholics reading this blog, please forgive for giving a very brief and practical overview of Lent, I’m sure there is more to it and those interested to learn more please feel free to Google it!

So now we all know (sort of) what Lent is, the other part I need you to understand is related to the “what” as a family we wanted to give up this year. Unusually, we all decided to give up the same thing, providing each other with extra support over the next 40 days, bring us together as a family, a “Family Lent commitment” if you like. So we sat at the kitchen table and we brainstormed what we all liked as a family that would be good to give up for Lent. And yes, if you know the Snyders well enough, you would have guessed we decided to give up our weekly family trip to the local KFC! My family has adopted my addiction to Kentucky Fried Chicken taste, and we have our routine trip every week to the local KFC restaurant where we order the same thing every time and enjoy our “finger licking good” moment together. So it was set, we would, as a family, give up KFC for Lent. As an FYI; Lent began two weeks ago and runs for the next forty days.

Now, you would think this was an easy task, right? It is only once a week, Lent is 40 days, take 40 divided by 7; we just have to be away from KFC for 5 weeks. No problem…. But here is where I make the connection to the statement “Don’t give up for Lent”. Unfortunately, just one week into the 40 days of Lent, on the Saturday, my son was away with a friend, my daughter had a friend round for a sleep over, my wife did not feel like cooking that night and so we decided to go out and eat… but what? This was the first weekend we cannot have KFC, so where do we go for a quick bite? We don’t like Burgers, we don’t want to sit at a restaurant, and we are not into Indian take always, what to do? And yes, you may have guessed it right, we failed and went over the KFC! We felt so bad… it was a feeble moment and we felt for it! We had now broken our promises and given up on Lent! Oh well, we had been good other years, surely everyone is allowed one time not to follow Lent! I’m sure we will be forgiven… eventually!  When our son found out, he was flabbergasted we had done it and said “well I’m not giving up” which was a good lesson for us.

So we felt bad we had given up our promise for Lent. Being adults and matured beings we thought, “you know what, we broke it now, so that’s that, next year we’ll stick to it” this was a wicked way of saying “we failed so let’s carry on and eat KFC at the weekends!”.

And it was that Sunday morning when the epiphany came along, the sermon of our priest hit me right between the eyes as he said “Lent is a time for giving up something, some of you out there have made that commitment and are sticking to it, other may have not chosen not to do anything because you thought it as too much hard work to stick to it and some of you may have started really well with all good intentions to keep your promise, then something happened and you give up. But Lent is about not giving up and if you’ve failed to stick to your promise, go back to it, start again and most importantly, don’t give up on Lent” and at this moment I knew it was not just giving up KFC, but we should not give up on us as a family.

For me this message was more than just a religious guilt trip for not sticking to doing Lent. It is about not giving up on things, not giving up on anything you do. So often we find ourselves quitting because we failed to complete something or we could not be bothered to finish it or just simply because we thought we don’t have the will power to stick to it. Think about it? How many of us have given up on our dreams because we thought, “it will never come true” Did you give up on being an Astronaut, Fire Fighter, a Doctor or a Singer? Perhaps it was too hard, or we didn’t focus enough to do it. How many times have we given up on something we wanted to do because we thought we didn’t have the will power to do it? Diets, giving up smoking, keep going to the gym. How many times have we given up on someone, because we think they will not make it or don’t have the ability to do something? How many times in our lives we keep on giving up just because it was the easier option?

This “epiphany” made me realised that no one should ever give up on “Lent”. We all have the opportunity to get back onto it, whatever it was we gave up on, to not give up and try again. After the blog, take time and reflect on “what” you may have given up, remember, there is still time to pick up where you left off and no more KFC for us for 4 weeks!

Week Eleven – it could happen to me!

Forest Gump said, “life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’ll get next!

From running 8k to not being able to breath!

Following on the theme of last week’s blog “it could never happen to me” this week I have experience one of those life-changing moments that often we think “it could never happen to me” but in fact it could.

I began my week as usual and without incidents after an active weekend and my first outside run of 8k. However, by Monday afternoon I started to feel slightly unwell and with a discomfort on my chest. Within an hour this discomfort turned to sever chronicle chest pains, which lead me to ask my wife to drive me to the hospital. Anyone who knows me, like my wife does, would know that if I asked to be driven to hospital something serious is happening! As we arrived at the Emergency Room the pain in my chest increased making me feel more unconformable and unable to breath properly.

So yes, I though I was having a heart attack! This is actually the second time I have found myself in this situation. About eight years ago, as I came back home from a long trip I found myself with similar symptoms and was taken to the hospital by an ambulance with a suspected heart attack. Back then I was one of the most unfit persons I knew, weighing over 96 kilos, smoking and drinking as well as enjoying my regular hamburgers and KFC buckets. So no surprise I ended in hospital with a suspected heart attack! In fact this was my wake up call and the day I changed my habits; gave up smoking and lost weight, as well as starting my passion for running! (I still indulge myself to KFC ever so often, a man’s got to have a small sin…)

But that was then, and this was now, and as we drove to the hospital and then sat waiting to be seen by the doctors all I could think of was “why me?” I’m healthy, and exercise, why would I be having a heart attack?” and this is when I realised that life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get next…

One moment I was running 8k and enjoying life, then next I was in hospital struggling to breath and with horrendous chest pains. So it could happen to me!

I was discharged from hospital after 3 days… for now! They’ve run every test they could think of, and every time they thought it could be something, it came out negative! My heart is apparently fine, there are no chest infections affecting it, there are no blood clots anywhere, not even a sign of heart or lung issues, but yet tests still showed that something is putting pressure on my heart, hence I am finding it difficult to taken deep breaths and get pain when I walk. I have to go back to hospital next week for further test; I have been referred to the cardiologist, as the doctors are baffled as to what is causing this pressure.

The time in hospital help me think about the situation I was in, and the fact that this was the second time I was there under similar circumstances. Could this be just another “suspected” heart attack? Or was I having one? Till today I am not sure what I have, and this makes me think that anything can happen, even if you think you are healthy, anything can happen to anyone at any time and we must not take life for granted.

It was 2 am on Tuesday morning when my wife had gone back home after being told by the nurse “there’s nothing you can do now, go home and rest” (not sure these are the most re-assuring words you can say to someone who’s partner is in hospital not knowing what is wrong with them!) and I was moved to the ward where I would spend the night. The next 4 hours became crucial for my state of mind and to help me through the next few days.

That night, at points, it was comical and I began to formulate the idea for my next play. A 98 year-old woman called Margaret laid in bed shouting “Nurse” every two minutes, and as the nurse would come over and asked her what she needed, Margaret would just smile at her and say nothing. “Nurse” she would say again two minutes later and the same repeated until I was moved to another ward, an hour later. There was also Humphrey, an 86-year-old man who was brought into to the emergency room a few hours before me and had also been now moved to this ward right next to Margaret and opposite me. He added to the comedy element by suddenly getting up and started to wander around. The Nurses tried to get him back to bed with no success until a male porter came over and Humphrey welcome him with a big smile calling him David. Humphrey was of course referring to his son, not to the night porter, but this helped them to bring him back to his bed and try to get him back to sleep. Thought the biases for a good script, I was witnessing the sad reality that most of us will end up in.

One of the nurses felt sorry for me and they decided to move me to another room. Once moved to the second ward where there was more peace and quiet, between kindles being inserted into my veins and stomach and the endless questions I had been asked several time by several nurses in other wards, I took the time to reflect where I was and why I was there. The first think that came to my mind, as it did last time I was there eight years before, was what can I do better now to make sure I’m not in this situation again. And after thinking long and hard I realised this time there was little I could do to change as I already live a healthy and active live. I then turn my attention as to why I was feeling a pain and could this be something more serious. I’m the most untypical person (but perhaps at typical man) when it comes to worrying about health. My arm needs to be literally falling off for me to think I should go to the doctor and have it seen to! Yet this time, because of not having something to blame the situation on (i.e. unhealthy habits) I actually felt scared.

In one of the training classes I have taught in the past we teach participants to understand the difference between fear and anxiety as a way to help them deal with difficult situations.  The difference between them is very simple, fear has an object, in other words we are frighten of something; a barking dog, a drop from a window, a man with a gun; where as anxiety has no object and therefore cannot be frighten of anything which turns fear into anxiety; the fear of the unknown. I soon became aware of this, of the fact that I had nothing to be frightened of. I’ve not been given any bad news, I have no object to deal with or be scared of, if I was not careful my feelings could soon turn into anxiety and lose control of my situation. So I lay there instead thinking about the things that are important in life; family, friends, work, my blog and the next play I will write with two characters called Margaret and Humphrey!

On my last day in hospital as I sat there still waiting for new, my wife said, “are you not worried?” “What should I be worried about? What will be will be and there is nothing you can do about it” I replied to her in a calm voice. I of course would like to know if there is something wrong so I can deal with it, trust me, it’s not easy when you have to wait. But what I do not want is to turn my fear into anxiety as a result of not having something to fear, because anxiety can lead to other more serious issues and I am not prepared to do that.

One key learning for me this week has been the fact that in life, we can be as prepared as we like but there will always be a curved ball thrown at us, and the stronger we are, the better we can deal with this “unexpected” events which one way or another will disrupt all plans in our lives! We mustn’t let these situations turn into anxiety, which we can’t then handle.

So next time you grab a chocolate from that box and you think “what that heck was that!” remember the wise words of Forest Gump and be ready to deal with the un-expected in your life!

Week Ten – it’ll never happen to me!

What are the odds? When you play the lottery the chances of winning are far too high for some people to care, but it only takes one set of numbers to win!

How often in life have we thought, “it will never happen to me!” This mentality comes from the fact that we know in many situations the odds of something happening are far too high. The safest mode of transport known to man is an airplane. The odds of you dying on a car crash are far higher than on a plane. However, the more you flight, the higher the odds and considering that last year I took 123 single flights puts me at a higher risk of dying in a plane crash than someone who just took a flight to go on vacation. But the interesting thing about odds is that yes I increase my chances by taking more flights, but like the lottery, it only takes one flight to put an end to someone’s life. Do odds then become bad luck? That person who only takes one flight per year, ends on the plane destine for a fatal crash? Whatever it is, we know that everything in life is a gamble, a risk you have to take and the more you do it the higher the risk, but in the end it only takes one set of number or being on the plane for it to happen.

I became aware of this concept this week as I began to observe an interesting behaviour in people. Risk taking is something we human being are good at. We love to take risks. And often our attitude becomes defiant and superior to the risk and odds involved in the things we do. We are all guilty of this, it is in our nature, and we all, at some point or another, thought, “it will never happen to me” whether consciously or unconsciously. Let me give you some examples.

In the UK as I am sure in many other countries, when you travel by what we call Coach (long distance Buses) you are required by law to wear your seatbelt. This enforcement of the law, like many similar requirements, has come about as a result of fatal accidents and people loosing their lives. A bus carrying 56 people, if it crashes, could have serious fatal consequences and depending on how sever the crash is, may claim many if not all lives. However, wearing a seatbelt may decrease your chances of loosing your life. If the Coach overturns, the belt may just keep you strapped to your seat and stop you from rolling around and either causing long term damage or claim your life. It’s a simple premise, buckle up and increase your chances of staying a live! And it is not a terrible inconvenience to sit secured to your seat. So why do people don’t do it? It’s beyond comprehension. This week I had a coach driver that took her job very seriously and the safety of her passengers was clearly number one to her. This is reassuring when she has in her hands the lives of 56 people. So she ensured, unlike other drivers, that everyone had buckled up! She walked through the coach checking everyone had done his or her seatbelts up. There was a lady seating next to me on the other side of the aisle. She was not wearing her belt and the driver, politely asked her to put it on. With a strop she did (how inconvenient I’m sure she thought) and the driver then took her sit. As soon as we started moving the woman took it off! And I thought, “well, there you have a rabble without a cause!” At the next stop, more passengers came on, the driver did again her routine and the lady, before the driver reached her seat, strapped herself on. And as soon as the driver walked away she again took it off and this is when it downed on me, who was she fooling, the driver or herself? If the coach crashes, it’s not the driver who looses but her, risking her life just to be a bit more comfortable. I am sure this lady’s mentality was “it will never happen to me”

Being now aware of this, I spend the week looking for this behaviour as I travel and it was amazing to see how many people take risks consciously or unconsciously thinking, “it will never happen to me”; here are other amazing examples of this behaviour:

I was in a mini bus with a group of people going out for dinner, I strapped myself in and another person followed, the rest sat chatting and enjoying the ride. When I challenged everyone to wear their seatbelts one person said, “No need, it’s only round the corner” remember it only takes a second to be in a car crash!

On the plane you are reminded by the Capitan and crew to always wear your seatbelts while sited even if the signs are off. What may be thinking what could be the danger; the plan is not just going to suddenly stop! If an airplane goes through what they call air-pockets it can suddenly drop, if you are not strapped in, you will end up like a pancake, tossed too high and stuck to the ceiling! If you didn’t know this could happen and one of the reason why you are asked to wear your seatbelts, it is still not an excuse not to follow instructions, remember what I said at the beginning, these safety measures are in place usually as a result of a previous experience, so you don’t need to know why you are asked to do something, specially when they tell you is for your own safety! But despite the announcements and reminders, as soon as the “fasten your seatbelt” sing comes off, people unstrapped themselves! I’m sure they are thinking, “What can happen to me?”

I also saw several people using their mobile phones while driving, and not just talking but texting. I am guilty of this and often my wife reminds me of the grave danger I put my family when I do it. And guess what? Yes I have often though “it’s only one second”; but again, it only takes one moment of distraction to end up on the back of someone else’s car. By the way yesterday I was driving and I needed to check something on my phone, I took it out looked at it and handed it over to my wife! I try to do what I preach! J

And so on, the examples of how defiant we are kept on flooding in; people standing in front of the yellow line on the platform waiting for the train (the line is there as a safety measure not to get knocked by the passing train), crossing the streets with a red light (we always believe we can be quicker than the incoming traffic!), driving slightly faster to save 1 minute (in a car crash fatalities are high the faster you are going) And the more I observed the more I became conscious of this terrible fault we have as Human Beings; putting our safety in unnecessary risk situations because somehow we think “it will never happen to me”. I am a great believer that if its your time to go its your time to go and there is nothing you can do about it, I have no doubt about that, but if we can avoid increasing the chances of something happening to us, why wouldn’t you wear a seatbelt?

Take care; some times as they say it’s better to be safe than sorry and believe me, from now on I am defiantly going work on reducing the chances of me not being able to finish this project of writing 52 blogs! I need to get to the end! J

Week Nine – Who are you, really?

As I was yet again squashed against hundreds of strangers on the underground I thought to myself, “I’ve no idea who you are, yet here we are sharing our very intimate personal space”

Who's that sitting next to you?

A few years ago, when I used to live in London and travel in the underground every day, I had an idea for a play. I realised that every day, I took the same train from the same station at the same time to go to work, and I would take the same train form the same station at the same time to go back home. And yet every day I would only see a handful of people whom I recognised from this routine of my every day life. It was extraordinary that every day, amongst hundreds of passengers, only a few would do the same routine as me. I have always been fascinated by the concept that every day we sit next to total strangers and for a few moments, minutes and in some cases hours, as we share confine spaces with these people, we actually don’t know anything about them. Total strangers that you may see only once in your life, people whom you have no connection, nothing in common except sharing that public space for that period of time. As far as we are aware these individuals are going somewhere, we make the assumption, as they are on public transport. But where are they going? We don’t know. Where have they come from? We can only guess and what were they doing before they got onto the train? Only God knows! What they did the night before, the weekend before, where are they going after their journey, next week, their next holiday? Are they married or single (we can only guess by rings in their fingers) do they have children or a pet? Do they smoke or drink? What do they like to eat? And the more you think about it, the more you realise that you are sitting next to a complete stranger.

Now, this is something we have done all of our lives, it is nothing out of the ordinary and it is a way of life. But what I am fascinated about is thinking whom are we really sitting next to? Think about this; you know the famous phrase “don’t judge a book by its cover” well this is so true in this case! Do you really know whom you are sitting next to? What we may see is not what may be behind the façade.

Everyone we see during our travels, the majority of commuters I meet on the rush hour train from Victoria Station to Oxford Circus, are probably the average person who has just waken up, had breakfast, got dress and jumped onto the train to go to their work or school. And they will most probably come home to more routine stuff. However, how do we know that? How do we know that the person standing next to you is not a victim of abuse in his or her relationship? How do we know that the person sitting next to you was not up all night surfing the Internet for porn? How do we know the person walking right next to you is not a paedophile? How do we know the person occasionally glancing at you across the train is not radical extremist? How do we know if any of these individuals have not been convicted before for a crime? We just simply don’t know and by looking at them it’s impossible to tell.

The play I wrote back then was entitled “from Ealing to Holborn” (two train stations on the Central line in London’s underground system) and it’s the story of a young man who sits on the train on his way to Holborn station. John for the first time in his daily routine on public transport realises that he may be sitting next to someone who has just murdered his wife. This thought comes to him as he sits board on the train on one of his daily monotonous trips in the underground and to pass by the time he starts to play a game in his mind (involving the audience), trying to guess whom the people on the train really are.

Throughout the play we see various characters step out of the action and enact their realities vs. what John thought; we see situations from abusive relationships to cross dressing at the weekends, but each individual steps into a world unknown to our main character. And each individual’s private life does not reflect his or her appearance, playing with the concept that you can’t judge a book by its cover. Often the most normal looking individuals are the once that may have the darkest secrets and those who look like they have just stepped out of the Mad House may be the most average individuals you have ever met (I tried to avoid using the word normal here as I think normal can mean many things, so let’s just go with average)

This idea of not knowing who the person sitting next to you is, may not be as scary as I make it sound in the play and often as you stand at the station waiting for your train, the person next to you, well, will probably be an average individual going to work. However, the idea behind the play is to demonstrate that its not just about not knowing those you meet for a short time on your journey to work, but its about asking the question how well do we know those in our lives? As the main character becomes closer to the audience, towards the end he has build a bond with them, at which point he seems to be the only “average” person in that carriage. After an hour of interaction with them, he has built a false sense of comfort with the audience, leading them to think they know him. And it is of course at the end of the play when you see that even if you think you know someone, they may not turn up to be whom you thought they were (I won’t tell you the ending, you may want to read the play one day and I don’t want to spoil the surprise!) This is something that happens to us every day in our lives. I saw someone put in their Facebook status this week “Those who are closest to you are the ones who you don’t know that well” Obviously someone who got hurt by someone they thought they knew!

For me this is the question that lingered in my head this week; how well do we know those around us? How well do we know our boss, neighbour, our kid’s teacher, work colleagues, or even those close to us? Of course if we think about this too much we would never trust anyone, and perhaps we shouldn’t, but I guess what I am saying here is that no matter how much we think we know someone, there is always something we may not know about them. It may not always be a deep dark secrete, sometime it’s just simply, not knowing who they really are.