Bear with me on this one. It was something I was thinking about and just decided to turn it into a blog post for Sky.

Dreamer

You know what I hate the most about myself? Like, really. And trust me... I don't say that lightly, because I hate A LOT of things about myself. But really, truly, what I completely detest, what I absolutely can't stand? The fact that I am a dreamer. That's right. I said it.

I have a friend (he and I don't always exactly get along) that says all Christians should be optimists, that it's what God calls us to be. I wholeheartedly reject that. This world is broken, and I don't know why God would want us to see it any other way. I'm not saying we should all be pessimists, either. It's just going too far in the opposite direction. And if you're an optimist, good for you. If you're a pessimist, I feel you. Sometimes I'm one, too. But you know what I really am? A realist. I don't see the glass as half-full, but I also don't see it as half-empty. I see half a freaking glass of water, because THAT'S WHAT IT IS. You don't have to see things in a good light or a bad light... why can't you just see it in... I don't know... a light that actually shows what the freaking heck it is?!?

This friend and I argue his point on a fairly regular basis. But what I don't admit to him because I just can't, is that I know what it's like to be an optimist.

Because don't get me wrong... I am a realist. 99% of me is all there. But then there's that 1%... that terrible, horrible 1%. That's my dreamer. That's the part of me that clings to hope. And that's the part of me that I hate the most. Trust me, I do most certainly hate that other 99% of me. But the 1%? It is so. Much. Worse.

Because dreams... dreams are like fire. Fire is beautiful. Fire is absolutely fascinating. You just... you want to touch it, you want to feel it. I can stare at fire for forever and it never gets old. Fire can be good, too. Even life-saving, in certain situations. But here's a fact. Fire. Burns. It literally has to. If fire isn't burning something, it's not there. Boom. End. Of. Story. And if you touch it, fire burns YOU. Also an absolute fact. Now, not every fire you ever see will burn you. Sometimes, you see fire... usually a small fire like a candle, and you walk on past with barely a glance its way. That fire is also small enough that if you were to touch it, it wouldn't do all that much damage. But the thing is, it's lacking the fuel to get bigger. If it was given more fuel, it would grow. Grow more beautiful, and also more dangerous. Other times, you do look at fire, even for a long time, like in the summer, roasting marshmallows with your friends, and it still doesn't hurt you. But that's because you never got close enough for it to hurt you. Maybe you and your friends were playing with it... you know, lighting sticks and waving them around and what not... all of those utterly stupid things that we teenagers do... but still, no one got hurt. Well, you still didn't get close enough. That could have been luck. You can do the exact same thing with fire ninety-nine times, and then the hundredth time, doing the exact same things, you can burn yourself. Or you can burn your house down. Don't argue with me, because you know it's true. Not every fire burns you. But every fire has the capability to.

Well, dreams are the exact same way. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're beautiful. They're fascinating. They make life interesting. Sometimes, dreams keep us alive. If I wasn't a dreamer, I couldn't write like I do. Never. And not every dream you have is going to hurt you. I'm not going to lie and say that it will. I mean... yeah. Some dreams come true, I guess. Many are let-downs, but I'm sure I'm just in a bad mood right now and if I tried again when I get out of it, I could think of something. Like... okay, Disney Land. I went several years ago with my family, a dream come true, an amazing opportunity, especially for our family. And yeah, it was amazing. Probably everything I dreamed. And then it ended so you know even if a fire doesn't burn you it does eventually die so that's kinda depressing but anyway. I know that dreams can be good. But every dream you conjure up has the ability to hurt you. And it doesn't matter how many dreams you've had and come out safe on the other side, it can always happen. It's not always immediate. Oh, no. It's those that aren't that hurt the absolute worse. Because yeah, those instant ones suck. Like, you meet someone once somewhere, really hit it off, and really hope that you'll be able to get to know them better, and then they never come back, and you go home depressed when you realize they ain't coming back. It's disappointing. You were dreaming about the amazing friendship you two would have and that dream just burnt you. But what if you're already friends? What if you know that these things are dangerous, so you think you're being smart, because you're taking it slow, not wanting to dream about this friendship, not diving into things head-first, not wanting to allow yourself to rely on the person. But then it's a long time, and you don't even really feel yourself relying on them... they're just part of life, and they'll always be there, right? Maybe you do realize you've come to need them, but they've been around for so long and you trust them so much that you know they won't hurt you. But then they do. They burn you... they stab you in the back, they have to move, you get in a fight and they walk away... anything... and they burn you like really, truly hurts. It's a burn that doesn't heal within a couple days, but that takes weeks, months, years, and lifetimes to go away. You always remember it. You always feel the ache. And you thought it was safe.

That's how dreaming it is. This sucky life is a rollercoaster, constantly going up and down. But without dreams, you wouldn't have those hills. Maybe it would be flat. Or maybe, you know, you'd always be going down, but then at least you wouldn't know that glorious feeling of going up so it wouldn't hurt so bad. Those instant-failure dreams take you up and down constantly, teasing you and dropping you over and over again and it's flipping annoying, but not so agonizingly painful as the other kind. That kind... that drawn out kind that happens when you're dumb enough to trust someone or something because it's always been there... it's like a steady incline upwards, a tiny incline, one that's barely there, but it is always there. It become the new flat. Other things take you up and down and up and down, but it's off of that incline, and you always end with that dream pulling you up, tiny bit by tiny bit. When it lasts a long time, that tiny bit can take you really, really far up. And then it goes away. And you're not allowed that easy incline down. Oh, no. You traveled up a foot a day for a thousand days, and then the dream goes away, and you fall back down that thousand feet in a matter of seconds. A slow, steady incline up and then, boom! Gone. STRAIGHT. DOWN.

So I HATE that little dreaming voice inside of my head. It's ALWAYS there. The rest of my brain will look at something from a realist perspective. It'll be trying to take things as they are and realize that this world sucks and hope only exists to be crushed, and then there's this obnoxious little voice in the council meeting. "But what if?" "But this could happen!" "Wouldn't this be awesome?" "Someday, we're gonna do this, and it's gonna be amazing." "This person is so amazing... we really need them, am I right?" Everyone else screams at that person to shut up, to just sit down and shut up, but he never listens. He won't stop shouting his hopeless lies, and he's in my brain, so I hear everything he says, and even though the rest of my brain is telling me to ignore him and be real, I still have that voice telling me there's hope when there's just not.

Like... Inside Out. Great movie, great cartoon, Pixar did well. But there are two characters in that movie that drive me flipping crazy. So. Annoying. And you know who they are? Joy, and Sadness. The other three emotions are awesome. Hilarious. Relatable. I absolutely adore them. But Joy and Sadness are the most obnoxious beings on the face of the planet. Why do you think that is? Maybe because they're opposites. They're extremes. And it's just... it drives you insane.

Or here's another illustration from that movie. They have daydreams, right? Thoughts, and memories, that they entertain. Well, here's that obnoxious little dreaming twirp in my head again. All of the other people up there are trying to throw out all the stupid, unrealistic dreams out (Dreaming Twirp came up with them in the first place and created the problems, for the record.) But then little Dumb-Face waltzes in. The other people are throwing those stupid dreams over their shoulders as fast as they possibly can, but he's behind them, scrambling to gather them all up and put them back in place. It's a never-ending cycle, which means that Dumb Face ultimately wins, and I'm left with all of those stupid dreams that are going to get crushed and break my heart when they do.

Because that's how dreams work, 97% of the time.

I just... you know what I wish? I wish that when I say, "I'm fine," I could really, truly mean it. Like, fine. A flat line on that rollercoaster. But when are we ever really FINE? When we say that, we never mean it. We're either dying on the inside, or, strange fantasy, we're actually happy, better than fine, excited or something. I don't know... I'm trying to think and literally can't find a time that I said I was fine when I was actually better than fine. I can't really find a time that I was better than fine period. But. I'm sure it happens. Some people respond with, "I'm awesome!" when they are, but most don't. Most simply act like a normal person and don't burst over with all the happiness that's pent-up inside. At least, I assume so. I wouldn't know. When I say that I'm fine, I'm typically screaming on the inside, sobbing in a puddle of tears because life is pain. But... wouldn't it be nice to say I'm fine, and just be... fine. Flat. Line.

Maybe I'm weird, but that sounds like heaven to me.

Sure, you'd be robbed of the highs, but every high comes down. That's like, they're purpose, I think... not to soar, but to crash. At least, that's the memorable part of their existence. Wouldn't it be nice to just be flipping okay for once? Truly okay? Or even just on a steady decline. Dreams give you hope, the hope gets crushed, and then everything hurts 500% worse.

So that's what I hate the most about myself. I. Hate. Being. A. Dreamer.