Mount Vernon High School

October 20, 2023 Where Your Dreams Go To Die We should all have dreams - visions of achievement we spend our time thinking about and wishing for. Dreams are an important element of success in any area of life - in sports, at school, at work, or at home. Building or becoming something great starts with a dream. I hope today you have a clear vision of what it is you want to build or who it is you want to become. Of course, in many ways, dreaming is the easy part. Actually building or becoming something great - turning the dream into reality - requires a unique level of effort and commitment and sacrifice that most people aren't willing to accept. A dream is the easy first step in a long, slow, often solitary and sobering journey to the place you've decided you want to go. Taking the next step on that journey requires you to embrace that growth and improvement can only happen in the space beyond your comfort zone. In today's world, that concept - intentionally choosing discomfort - isn't popular. Advancements in tech and lifestyle have continually made our comfort the top priority. Almost everywhere you look, what’s easy is encouraged. What’s convenient is commercialized. What feels good is what’s fostered. There’s an incongruence today that exists between what people want and the reality of what getting it requires. But the truth is, you can be comfortable, or you can be great...but you can't be both. Your comfort zone is where dreams go to die. You can be comfortable, or you can be great...but you can't be both. Your comfort zone is where dreams go to die. The problem is that the comfort zone is so attractive. Not only are you constantly barraged by the influence of our culture, the voice of your inner loser is also relentlessly rationalizing the benefits of comfort. Your inner loser is the unhealthy and unproductive voice in your head that keeps you from pursuing your best. It says whatever it needs to say - true or not - to keep you comfortable and safe and average. “It won’t be worth it,” your inner loser urges, “so better not take the risk. You probably don’t have what it takes anyway. Going all in for your dream will just expose that fact for everyone to see. Maybe someday, but not today. Trust me. Just take it easy and let’s talk again tomorrow.” If you're serious about building or becoming something great, then It’s important to recognize not only where your dreams go to die, but how that destruction happens. In the comfort zone, dreams aren't obliterated in a moment of catastrophic extinction. They aren’t blown to smithereens or smashed into dust. In the comfort zone, dreams die slowly and gradually. It’s an almost painless and unwitting process. Every time you choose to make comfort your top priority, a tiny sliver of that dream rots away. On its own, of course, that sliver doesn’t amount to much. In fact, it may not be noticeable at all. But little by little, over the course of time, the health and sustainability of that dream continues to decline. Eventually, at some point, you realize that the vision you once had for what you could build or what you could become is no longer strong enough to survive the journey that creating it requires. Your dream has died. Maybe without even knowing, your commitment to comfort killed it. The voice of your inner loser can be loud and convincing, but I want to challenge and encourage you today to stop and listen for a different voice in your head…the voice of your inner champion. That’s the voice in your head that’s given you that vision for what you could build or become, and the voice that's driving you to be the person you were created to be. It’s the voice that clarifies the truth, that choosing to step outside your comfort zone and pursue your dream doesn’t guarantee success, but it does eliminate regret. It clarifies that life outside your comfort zone is hard, but that you’ve got what it takes. It clarifies that your dream is worth chasing, and that choosing to do what champions do - choosing to move beyond your comfort zone, and towards that vision you've created - moves you one step closer to making it reality. -Travis