The road to excellence is filled with potholes. As hard as those may be on the quality of the ride, they’re not the biggest threats to making dreams a reality.

The biggest threat to making one’s dream come true is the exits along the way that are dressed up as rest areas.

These lovely traps are full service stops with bright lights and scenic views. Their roads are smooth with well marked lanes. Unlike the road to your destination, the GPS knows the way off very well.

Keep Moving

The person who makes their dream come true often looks like the hero who did magic overnight. Most detours will criss cross over the original route as a teaser to let you know what you could have been doing.

During the early criss crossing, it appears that those who stayed the course and risked damages in enormous potholes are the ones losing out.

Many will cruise ahead and do amazing wonders on the path that is not their intended journeys. In the end, the feelings of disconnectedness, feelings of regret, failure, and squandered time choke out any meaningful appreciation of the work done. That’s why these detours are filled with amazing sceneries, amazing shopping areas, and tech wonders. To numb the hollow feeling of emptiness that comes with doing what is not within one’s zone of genius.

The people who stayed the course and struggled through eventually have built better ways of avoiding the potholes as well as beefed up their suspensions to ride more smoothly over the challenges.

These are the folks who look like amazing superstars when they’re at the end of their journey. The ones with the smile of contentment, success, significance. The ones who have made impacts and have lived with purpose.

Sure, not all who stay the course see the fruits of their labor. Much like the case of those cruising down easy street, not all will see the end either.

Yet, one has to keep moving. Keep pressing. Keep moving forward.

How do keep moving

As simple as it sounds, one has to regularly check in on the vision. In 2018, how often have you reviewed your goals, your ambitions, your vision, your dream?

Without regular, even daily, check-ins, it is easy to get distracted by all the wonderful shiny refreshing rest areas of life. Those fantastic exits that don’t always route back to the path you’re to take.

For this blog, the point of pressing forward was to learn new ways to tell a story. This year, the endeavor is to tell stories that are more meaningful and more interesting. That means learning a lot more about the techniques that go on behind the scenes.

Last week’s post of a Random Test was proof of the efforts that must take place to advance with my writing. Was it fun? No. Was it easy. No. Was it worth it, absolutely! Now I know a better way of telling certain stories. I’m all the more excited.

In the process of moving forward, one has to also keep in mind the increase pace and stamina. Not the sprinting to the end variety, but the continual challenging of oneself.

I got comfortable blogging with Word years back. It was not the most effective way for me to work. Today, I use Scrivener. That took a bit of learning. I can rest there and be satisfied, but that won’t solve the other problems I’ve yet to tackle. So, now I’m learning a little of CSS and a little HTML as well as more Markdown.

These milestones give me something to look forward to. The drive stays focused because there are several reachable steps ahead… but in between the larger destination.