When a dream doesn’t become reality

Everyone has a dream: writing a book, traveling around the world or quitting your job and doing something completely different. Often, the dream doesn’t become your reality, even if you nurture it. Journalist Mariska Jansen asks: Is this such a bad thing?

According to Mark Rowlands, philosopher and author of The Philosopher and the Wolf: Lessons from the Wild on Love, Death, and Happiness, humans are focused on reaching our goals, and yet life is not ultimately about realizing our dreams. “If you think having a meaningful goal is the most important thing in your life, then your life loses its meaning when you reach your goal,” he writes.

The efforts we make to achieve our dream are also not where we find the meaning of our lives, he believes. Rowlands explains, with help from the myth of Sisyphus, who was cursed by the gods to push a boulder to the top of a mountain over and over again: “Life on the top of that mountain gazing at a goal he has already achieved is as meaningless as a life spent pushing a huge boulder up the mountain, just to see it roll down again.”