Yeah. I Wish.

“A goal without a plan is just a wish.”-Larry Elder

Image by Express Monorail via Flickr

If only for tonight, these two words together, “I Wish”, I would like to remove from my vocabulary.  I guess that in and of itself is an “I wish” statement.  I’m not liking it right now.  It seems to be almost counter-productive to me.  

It’s as if I am giving myself and excuse to not achieve.  Giving myself an excuse to not even make an attempt to do something because it immediately becomes un-attainable when those words are spoken.  Because in my mind when I make a wish, the fairy dust is supposed to fall from the ceiling and *POOF* there it is.  Just like the fairy tale it came from, what is wished for too becomes a part of that fairy tale.

And when it’s not there, it brings forth a bit of sadness because I had already imagined what I would be doing with whatever I had just wished for.  I’ll admit though that there is a bit of excitement or fun that goes along with it because of where I go when it’s wished for.  I’m not sure, though, that it’s worth the sadness of the reality.

Why do I do that to myself?  Sure, some wishes turn into goals, but very rarely I think.  Most likely that is why I’m having such a difficult time not smoking.  I find myself “wishing” I could quit.  I find myself “wishing” I could become a counselor.  I find myself “wishing’ I were out of debt.  I find myself wishing for things that ARE attainable.  BUT my mind is so accustomed to dismissing those wishes that it doesn’t take me seriously.

“What spurred this on,” you ask?

I stopped myself from responding to a tweet with an “I wish I could do that.”  I don’t know if I really, truly, WISHED I could do what I was about to say.  To say I wish I could do it was just an excuse for me to try and make myself feel better.  So I didn’t. I faced reality.

I was tweeting with @SteveGarufi tonight and he made a statement about riding his bike 95miles from Buena Vista to Colorado Springs.   I asked if he had ridden that far before and he said that he had.  One day last year he rode 128miles, and he sent me a link.  He had taken some pictures on his journey.  It wasn’t long though until I learned that this was only 1 day out of the 45 that it took him to bike across America.  When I learned that, WOW!  How awesome that must have been!  I can’t imagine the feeling of accomplishment that he must have had.  I wanted that feeling.  

He sent me the link to his site where he has pictures up of each day that he rode along with a description of the pictures.  He sent me a link to the map of his bike ride.  (I invite you to check out his site bikeacrossamerica.org. I’m still reading it and am just in awe.) 

I almost blurted out in response to his links and info, “Man, I wish I could do that.”  It was my minds way of giving me that feeling temporarily.  I fought it.  Instead I faced reality.  I told him how awesome it sounded but I wear out walking from the bed to the couch.  Reality.  

So does that mean that I’m planning a bike ride across America?  

Yeah.  I Wish.

Am I gonna stop wishing?

Man, I wish.

Because of HIM,

SC