One Day I Realized I Could Actually DO Things. :: The Life of the Traegorn

One Day I Realized I Could Actually DO Things.
Posted Sep 22, 2015 - 11:55:27	Tweet

Just a reminder, that I'm currently running an Indiegogo campaign to support the Nerd & Tie Expo - a new convention coming to Eau Claire, WI in 2016.

Help us make the convention a success! Donate now!

Nerd & Tie Expo - A New Con In Eau Claire, WI - September 23-25, 2016

We all have dreams. I've yet to ever meet a person who didn't have something that they didn't fantasize about one day achieving or doing. But most of us just sit around, never doing anything about it. Here's the thing - you don't have to.

Life circumstances may get in the way, and maybe it really is out of your reach -- but sometimes you'll be given an opportunity. And when opportunity presents itself, you need to take it.

There are times in my life where I've taken the opportunities in front of me - when I got the chance to build No Brand Con from scratch with a few friends of mine. We ended up building an event that changed the way cons were run in the region, and inspired a generation of event runners.

There are times in my life where I didn't take the opportunities in front of me. I let my own fears and anxieties hold me back. Now, I don't know if I would have been a success if I had taken them, but I know that the only regrets I have in this life are that I never tried when I could have.

I know people who don't follow their dreams because they have obligations or people counting on them -- and that's admirable. I hope their situation improves where they can one day reach for more. But I also know people who sit around and talk big... yet never doing anything.

Opportunity is sitting right in front of those people, but they don't take it.

And I honestly sit here wondering why.
- Traegorn

Trae, this is one of the best posts from you that I've ever read... and you've written a lot of great stuff. I have a few thoughts on one line from your post especially:

"I know people who don't follow their dreams because they have obligations or people counting on them -- and that's admirable. I hope their situation improves where they can one day reach for more."

I have a counterpoint to that, actually. I had a lot of big dreams of becoming a professional cartoonist and/or spending the rest of my life hopping from one foreign country to another, as the "backpacker" variety of ESL teacher.

Instead, I became a single parent. But in all honesty, I don't see this as having to set aside my dreams, exactly. It's more like I *reshaped* my dreams.

From my perspective, being the primarily caretaker of a small child forced me to set aside one set of dreams for another equally enjoyable set--- I had to work from home to give my son the amount of attention and care he needs... so I became a full-time freelance writer. That's been amazing, so much so that I wouldn't trade it for my original dreams. And getting to raise a kid has been a dream in and of itself--- perhaps the best and most rewarding experience of my life.

As my son gets older and caring for him gets less time-consuming, I may decide to devote more time to trying to become a full-on pro-cartoonist(my current writing job involves some paid cartooning, but it's less than 5% of what I do).

Once he's an adult, I may wind up backpacking the world for a while, who knows.

But I wouldn't count those possible future changes as my life "improving"--- I'm pretty happy with my life now, and I plan on being equally happy with it later, come what may.

Not to mention that-- hey--- I got to have a small part in revolutionizing regional cons before my obligations to to others and responsibilities placed me on a different path.

Anywyay, thanks for bringing me along on that ride, some 14 years ago. And thanks for continuing this blog. It's always an enjoyable read.