Clarifying Your Dream

My favorite John Maxwell book is called, “Put Your Dream to the Test”. One reason I enjoy it is because Dr. Maxwell takes the reader through a rigorous 10 question process of fully developing and testing a dream before launching it.

The purpose of the questions is of course, to make sure your dreams are well thought out, not just wishes or daydreams, and that they have enough substance behind them to have the greatest possible chance of succeeding.

While Dr. Maxwell’s book is an excellent resource for testing your dream, you have to first have a dream to test, and that’s the tough part for some people, myself included.

My own experience of putting my dream to the test has been a journey of continually defining and refining my dream as each step gave me more clarity, and that is what I want to speak with you about.

The Journey of Dream-Finding
For many years I didn’t consciously have a dream for how I wanted to serve the world through my vocation. I was in corporate America with a good job, and had a wonderful family. My dreams centered primarily on family and church, not so much on career.

My career dreams started after I was first laid-off and had to uproot my family and move across the country. That was the catalyst behind my first entrepreneurial dream.

With the dream of building a side income that would eventually lead me out of corporate America in mind, I started a real estate investment business, which I enjoy to this day. However, after about six years God began pulling me toward the next leg of the journey.

As I continued to grow as an entrepreneur, businessman, and leader of my church’s foreign missions committee, I began formulating thoughts on how I could develop a business that would be a ministry, and before long we were in the preschool business.

Circling Back to a Youthful Dream
During the time we owned the preschool I heard a speaker talk about the “new entrepreneur”, and at that moment my mind flashed back to my thoughts in college of using business as a means to help meet the economic and spiritual needs of hurting people.

Those thoughts had been put on hold for several decades as I built my career, raised my family, and grew in my faith. Immediately after hearing the speaker I went to my hotel room and mapped out my existing company, which is designed to expand the influence of Christian business owners in their communities.

Even now when the dream has become clearer and the business is launched, the need for increasingly greater clarity is always present. In every business I have started, there is the dream and the careful preparation, but when it is actually launched a whole new set of issues arise, and getting those right is key to fulfilling the dream.

What I Learned
Looking back, I see this process at work:
• A core vocational dream formed early around specific values;
• Stepping toward the dream through a business education and career;
• Temporarily forgetting the dream while building a family and church dream;
• Building toward the dream through entrepreneurial experiences;
• Crystalizing the dream after acquiring enough wisdom and experience to make it real.

This process would have been impossible without:
• Knowing I had a forming dream to begin with;
• Stepping toward the dream;
• Evaluating each experience against the dream;
• Refining the dream continually;
• Working constantly on personal, professional, and spiritual growth.

A Dream Tip For You
So if your dream seems unclear, it is still inside you. Look back to the thoughts of your youth and the decisions you made as a result of them. They may just help you understand your journey more clearly, and help you make the course corrections you need to clarify and fulfill your dream.

About the Author

Scott McClymonds is a serial entrepreneur and former corporate manager.

He is founder and CEO of Nehemiah Worldwide, a coaching and consulting firm helping build God’s kingdom through business.

Scott and his family live in Fayetteville, AR, USA, where they cheer heartily for the Ohio State Buckeye football team.

Contact Scott at http://johncmaxwellgroup.com/scottmcclymonds/