How to stay motivated when you don’t see results

One of the main issues that big dreamers encounter almost on a daily basis is the lack of big dreamers around them. A question I get asked often is how to dream bigger when everyone around you isn’t.

It’s true that the path to bigger, better dreams is often paved with the advice of well-intentioned people stuck in inherited dreams. I know them all too well. In my own life, and that of my clients, they often cause more harm than good. Of course, you can’t blame anyone for wanting to warn you about the “dangers” of going after your passion, and doing your own thing. The problem is not with them but with the world we’re born into. It simply isn’t made for big dreamers.

That’s why it’s important to get the juicy stuff elsewhere, to go in search of big dreamers and their stories.

One of the places I’ve found a lot of support and inspiration like that is biographies. Reading the biography of someone who has done it, who – against all odds – persevered, believed in herself and showed everybody wrong is one of my favorite ways to challenge my own inherited dreams, and that of the naysayers around me.

It’s so easy to fall into the trap of overnight success, and believe that the people we look up to today were just lucky, or that their success came out of nowhere. The truth is, no matter where they are today, everyone starts somewhere (probably at the bottom). By reading their stories we’re reminded that it’s possible, and we’re inspired to open our mind to new possibilities for ourselves.

How to read inspiring biographies?

Not all biographies are created equal. Some of them might be great stories but if you can’t identify with the person who went through it, you won’t be inspired. There’s a science to this madness! Here are my three tips on how to pick and read inspiring biographies.

• Make sure the story resonates with you

I love reading biographies of women. Being a woman myself, this is one of the easiest ways for me to resonate with someone else’s story. But it’s not the only one.

Reading about the success stories of people who started where I started, who went through similar struggles as I did, who had the same inherited dreams or social background… it all helps to make sense of their story and see how it could apply to me. For if they could do it, why couldn’t I?

• Find a common interest

Sometimes it’s not the person but the achievement or that person’s interests or focus that inspires most. I love reading stories from people who’ve made it in finance for instance, because money love is something I care about. I also love to read biographies of entrepreneurs, and people who’ve spent their life fighting for a good cause.

When there’s a common interest, it doesn’t matter so much what that person’s background is, or where they started. It’s why and how they did what they did that interests me, and that I learn from the most.

• Identify with the person you’re reading about

Here’s a third and final tip about reading biographies. When you’ve picked one up that resonates with you or that is interesting to you my advice is to read it actively. What I mean by this is that you shouldn’t just read it as a spectator. Put yourself in the shoes of the person going through the story. Imagine it was you. Feel into what that would be like, what your life would look like if that story was yours.

Visualizing is a powerful tool to dream bigger. Biographies are a great way to practice those skills! It will help you to be inspired and to take action on your own dreams.

If you don’t know where to start, here are a couple of inspiring biographies to get started with.

All Things at Once by Mika Brzezinski
Chanel: A Woman of her Own by Axel Madsen
Never Tell Me Never by Janine Shepherd
The Road to Someplace Better by Lillian Lincoln Lambert
Suits: A Woman on Wall Street by Nina Godiwalla

If you want more tips to get unstuck, I’ve got great news for you! This tip is part of a series, you can find all entries here.

3 inspiring women who achieved their big dreams

When I think of women with big, ambitious, crazy dreams they’ve achieved, I can’t overlook J.K. Rowling or Oprah Winfrey. Their stories inspire the world.

J.K. Rowling said of the time when she wrote the first ‘Harry Potter’ book that she was as poor as someone could be in modern Britain without being homeless, her marriage had imploded, she had a daughter to care for, and all she had was hope, a big idea, and a typewriter. Failure didn’t break her, it helped her discover who she was:

Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations. Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way.

Oprah Winfrey grew up in poverty. She was sexually abused as a child, ran away from home, and had a baby who died soon after birth when she was just 14. Her first boss told her she woudn’t make it in television because she was too emotional. She started her own TV show and it became the highest ranking TV show in America.

People refer to me as a brand now – the Oprah brand. I never knew what a brand was when I first started out. I became a brand by making every decision flow from the truth of myself. Every choice I made, for every show that was going to be on air, I made based upon ‘does this feel right?’, ‘is this gonna help somebody?’

J.K. Rowling and Oprah Winfrey are highly visible big dreamers, but they’re not the only ones. There are many other big dreamers, just like you.

I love to go in search of inspiring women like you and me who achieved big dreams. It helps me to keep going, and to know that I can do it too. The 3 women I want to talk about today aren’t global celebrities. They’re real, normal people, living normal lives. But each of them had a big dream they went after without giving up. Here are their inspiring stories.

Tahera Rahman

Tahera Rahman worked for WHBF (a local TV station in the USA) for two years as a producer before finally getting the chance to turn her big dream into reality.

Tahera always wanted to be a TV reporter, to bring the latest news to people’s homes, but even her mentors would tell her that it was unlikely she’ll ever get to do that. Why? Tahera is Muslim-American and wears a hijab.

The lack of Muslim-American women who wear a headscarf on camera was obvious — I was very aware of that fact — but I never considered this something that was impossible.

On February 8th, 2018, Tahera’s dream came true, as she became the first full-time broadcast TV reporter in America to wear a hijab on the air.

How did she do it? She worked hard and didn’t get discouraged, not even after multiple rejections. When she learned the station she was working for had an open position for an on-air reporter, she applied and she did everything that she could to become the perfect candidate for the job.

Montana Brown

At 24, Montana Brown became a pediatric nurse, fulfilling her big childhood dream. Montana met amazing, kind pediatric nurses during childhood, when she had to fight for her life and beat cancer, not once, but twice – first at age 2 and then again when she was 15.

On her first day working as a nurse at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta she wrote in a Facebook post:

Never in a million years did I think that at the age of 24 I would have achieved my biggest and wildest dream – to work at the hospital I was treated at as a child/teenager. It’s amazing and crazy and awesome and I’m SO excited to work with such an inspirational organization!!

What we can learn from Montana is that our big dream isn’t always about us, it can be about helping others and giving back some of the love and care we received when we needed it most.

Isabel Conde

Isabel Conde knows how to make a dream come true. She achieved hers at a young age through the power of determination, showing the world that where there is a will, there is a way.

Isabel’s big dream was to visit Peru and discover its magical mountains and nature. The obstacle? She had no money for the trip. So, the 18-year-old made a vision board of Machu Picchu and Cusco, Peru, and started working. Hard. For 6 months, she worked 3 jobs, sometimes starting work at 3 AM and finishing at 11 PM.

After those 6 months, she had $7,500 for her trip to Peru and $1,000 saved for college expenses for when she’d be back. Her dream was about to become reality.

She didn’t know anyone in Peru and she traveled alone. In the beginning, she had doubts about what she was doing, but as soon she saw the mountains, she knew she achieved something amazing. By making this dream come true she offered herself a unique gift, one that will stay with her for the rest of her life.

There isn’t anything you can’t do if you plan enough. A positive attitude, work ethic, and a plan are the only requirements to make your travel dreams come true. Even if you don’t have the money to travel now, with enough planning and dreaming it’s all possible!

What’s your big dream? Let me know in the comments below.