Recognizing Possibilities

When was the last time you surprised yourself? Did something that you knew was impossible?

Ever since I was a little kid, pounding out words on the ancient black metal typewriter named Remington Rand that my parents left in my room, I always dreamed of someday having a book published. MY book. I ‘knew’ it would probably never happen (the stories we tell ourselves!). I was realistic. I grew up after WWII in a working-class neighborhood of Queens called Jackson Heights, in NYC. When I was a kid, NYC was filled with people from all over the world who had escaped the war. All the fathers I knew had entry-level, blue collar jobs, and all the mothers were stay-at-home moms. College, or higher education, wasn’t an option for the kids in my neighborhood — especially for girls. Girls had three options: you could grow up to become a secretary, a nurse or a teacher. All of which ended once you married and had kids.

That was life, back then. But I loved reading! It transported me all over the world! I read all the time, and, in spite of the reality I lived in, I dreamed about someday being a published author.

My eventual books, as of this writing:

In this new series of writings — like newsletters, but not news, so I’ll call them thoughtletters — I’m going to share with you — among other things — some ideas about how to make your dreams, your craziest, wildest longings become reality. I know, it sounds hokey — but whatever you long for in life, no matter how weird or outlandish or even delusional people tell you it is — there is a simple way to make that happen.

Everyone told Diana Nyad that she was delusional to think that at her advanced age she could swim from Cuba to Florida. What a stupid, crazy, outlandish idea! (See the 2023 documentary, Nyad!)

All the other elite rock climbers told Alex Honnold (my son) that it was crazy to even consider going up El Capitan without a rope for protection. Anyone standing in Yosemite Valley and looking up could see how obvious that was. (See the 2018 Oscar-winning documentary, Free Solo!)

AP Film Writer Jake Coyle sums it up in an article he wrote for the Oakdale Leader in October of 2023:

“And just like Alex Honnold of Free Solo and the British cave divers of The Rescue, Nyad convincingly argues that to accomplish something great — to really dream big — you may need a dose of delusion, too.”

Your delusion, then, about ___ (fill that in) fits that category: people will tell you you’re crazy, you can’t do that, you’re too old or too unathletic or untrained or busy or whatever to even think about doing that.

They’re wrong.

When you do accomplish it, it will surprise the heck out of you! Because right now, you don’t think it’s possible, either. But surprising yourself, surpassing yourself, is such an amazing feeling, I want to share it with you and give you the tools to make that happen for you!

It doesn’t matter how old you are. What people say. What you’ve read in the media. None of that is important.

We’ll get into what really does matter, as you read through my musings about my own whirlwind life, as well as that of many others that I hope will inspire you as much as they did me. Here and there you’ll come across tips (from my next book) about how to approach your crazy, delusional dream, how to reel it in closer, closer, until what seemed unthinkable becomes completely doable. Despite the nay-sayers.

By now, everyone knows about the concept of ‘baby steps.’ You can do anything by baby steps, they say. The French have repeated this advice for hundreds of years, as evidenced by this centuries-old proverb, Petit à petit, l’oiseau fait son nid. (Little by little, the bird makes its nest.) One twig at a time.

But some essential information is missing there.

All the baby steps in the world won’t get you anywhere if you don’t know how to arrange them. Success is all about structure. Organization. Categories. The baby steps will follow.

So who am I to speak to this topic, or for you to take seriously?

You know a little about me if you’ve read my About page.

Everyone said I was crazy to even think that I could climb El Capitan, Yosemite’s iconic 3,200-ft granite wall. I spent my life at my computer, in the classroom, in the kitchen (and first tried climbing at age 59). Not exactly athlete material! I climbed it with my son at age 66. You can read about that and many other adventures in The Sharp End of Life (available anywhere you buy books.)

Anyone I talked to about creating an orchestra tried to convince me that I was in no position to even think about such a thing!… or to even consider conducting it. While teaching more than full-time hours. While single-parenting two extreme-athlete kids. While battling through a dissolving marriage, alone. But in 1990, despite all those distractions and more, the West Sacramento Community Orchestra was born, and I conducted it for four years (until I moved away).

For 44 years, I made five foreign languages seem easier to people on three continents, from pre-teens to retirees. My French textbook, Allez! (Cognella Publishers), is in its second edition. My kids are tri-lingual.

And everyone who knew me as a kid knew that I couldn’t breathe worth a darn. The house I grew up in for almost 25 years was always filled with cigar and cigarette smoke (both parents). I had to wave the thick gray cloud away to see the television. My lungs were shot. But I ran my first marathon at the age of 56.

Today’s introductory thoughtletter is an invitation for you to schedule this in. Sign up, free or paying, to join me here to explore life and all its possibilities. To learn how to accomplish whatever it is you dream about. I speak from experience, and you can, too — once your first ‘impossible’ accomplished goal is behind you.