To Kill or Not to Kill….Their Dreams

"What do you want to be when you grow up?" It's one of my favorite questions to ask young people. It's an open-ended, sky's-the-limit type of question. During my ten years as a youth group leader, I asked this question to hundreds of kids (6th through 12th grade). I noticed an interesting trend. The younger kids would give me one solid answer, but the older kids (typically 11th or 12th grade) would give me two answers.

For the younger kids, it's simple and confident: "I want to be an astronaut." "I want to be a vet." "I want to be a chef."

For the upperclassmen, it gets muddy. It morphs into something more like this. "I used to want to be an astronaut, but now I want to _______." "I used to want to be a chef, but now I want to ________." If they want to be the second thing they mentioned, why state the first one? Curious, I always ask them this question.

"The first answer is my real answer, but the second is my practical answer." Ah, now we're getting somewhere. Somewhere along the journey, someone killed their dreams. Someone decided this kid needed to think more practical, safer, and more achievable. Maybe it was their parents, or teachers, or friends, or coaches.....but it was probably the parents. Why? Because a child's foundational confidence comes from his/her parents. If the parents believe in the kid, it's unlikely that external forces will knock them down.

Here's the problem. In our effort to protect our kids from failure, struggle, and disappointment, we methodically kill their dreams as they grow up. After all, we want our kids to succeed. And falling flat on their face over and over and over doesn't feel like winning. Therefore, we steer our kids into safe, practical, and reliable career paths. We want our kids to make enough money to live, ideally more than enough. We want them to have security.

I might take some heat for saying this, but I don't care about any of that. I would rather my kids fail miserably in the pursuit of their dreams and callings and struggle to make enough income along the way than sell their dreams for safety, practicality, and security. If living a meaningful life requires them to face risk, adversity, and pain, I'll cheer all day for that.

I have zero aspirations for my kids to be wealthy or attain status. I aspire for my kids to live the most meaningful life possible.....period. I don't know what that means (yet) for them, but I will never kill their dreams. If one wants to be an astronaut, then I need to figure out how best to support that dream and encourage that journey. If the other wants to be a rocker, then I'll figure out how best to support that as well.

In a world where 70% of Americans dislike or hate their jobs, I'll be so proud if my kids end up in the 30% camp....whatever that looks like. Rich or poor, status or none, always living for meaning.

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