What’s the one dream you had to give up, and have you made peace with it?

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1. Getting married and having kids. It wasn’t my choice and it still haunts me everyday.

2. I’ll never have a car I really want. I couldn’t afford the insurance on a WRX when I was young. Then I was married and house broke. I’ll need some kind of family hauler for the next 10 years. By the then it really won’t matter that much. I’m fine with it. I have other things I really like.

3. Becoming a pro wrestler

4. Guess I will never be a ladies man.

5. Becoming an author.

   I had finally become serious about it around the time I was 30. Actually put words to paper. Even had a friend in the publishing industry read it and said it had a solid chance. I had about 270 pages written with a really solid ending in sight.

   And then I reread Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman.

   I had read it about 15 years prior. Apparently it made an impression because my story was his story almost beat for beat. I realized I couldn’t put that much effort into another project without fear of hitting that heartbreak again.

   I found peace in the fact that there’s thousands and thousands of excellent authors and books in the world. Now I build furniture for a hobby. People actually praise you for making replicas!

6. The only reason to give up on a dream is that it conflicts with achieving another dream that is more meaningful. If you forsake a dream because you lose confidence or the dream seems too distant, you could be betraying yourself in a way that you will regret.

   There is a project in Black hills of South Dakota called the Crazy Horse Memorial. Construction began 65 years ago and it is not expected to be completed for another 65 years. They are carving a mountain to honor Native Americans. The slogan of the project, first spoken by the sculptor in charge of the project – now deceased – is “Never Forget Your Dreams”

   https://crazyhorsememorial.org/

7. I wanted to fly. I got my private license, but never advanced past that, and ultimately had to give it up because it’s so f-ing expensive.

8. I was one physical away from a contract with the Air Force that boiled down to “We’ll train you to be a pilot, but if you wash out of flight school we’re kicking you out.” It was perfect. I had no interest in the military UNLESS it was to be a pilot. And who wouldn’t want to be a pilot? I aborted because I was married and my wife didn’t marry me to be a military spouse. She never said anything, mind you. But I knew….

   Fast forward 30 years. We’re both engineers working on a military base. Hell, her job requires constantly interfacing with Test Pilots. The topic of how close I came to going in comes up and my wife looks at me and asks if I ever wonder “what if?” My response? “Only when an airplane flies by.” (Which is about every 10 minutes around here.)

9. Owning a home is a pretty big one. I live in Canada and while my life is finally starting to get decent financially, everywhere here is expensive. In theory I could save up but it’d require housing prices to stay relatively stable and for me to be able to make more money to save for a down payment or keep living at my mother’s house into my late 30s.

   Going away for university and having a classic university experience. Instead I commuted which I hated and my degree isn’t even that useful. It’s a BA. In fact, it really held me back mentally in life.

   Living in Montreal. I can’t get the French down well enough to find a decent job there. It sucks because that’s a huge dream of mine but I know it’s likely not to happen. Can’t even go to school there because Quebec doubled out of province tuition.

   Finally, having a meaningful romantic relationship or a good sex life in my twenties. When I was in my 20s it meant a lot to have at least one of those.

   I’m still working towards it but I really lost most of my 20s due to depression, crummy family members invalidating my dreams, not doing what I wanted to and not enjoying life in general. Therapy, meds and an understanding that I need to take risks to get where I want to go has helped a lot and is finally allowing me to start recovering though.

10. I really wanted to be able to do the splits.

    With my crotch and both legs flat on the ground. A few months ago, I really pushed myself to get into it. I was training every day to get there.

    But I started getting back spasms about halfway through the training. The spasms meant I couldn’t run, and I felt stiff as hell.

    I decided to stop, and just focus on maintaining my general flexibility.

    I had gotten very close to it, about 10 years ago, but I couldn’t put the time in anymore. I guess being 36, instead of being in my mid 20s made a real difference as well.

11. Being attractive for the opposite sex and having a lot of sex.
    Not really made peace with it, but it is the only dream I failed. Rest I have achieved.

12. Running my own startup and becoming a professional musician.

    I’ve worked at enough failed startups to realize that the stress just isn’t something I want to deal with.

    I don’t mind not being a professional musician. It was always a reach to begin with. My software dev job pays enough that I can still buy instruments and other music equipment, so I’m still able to enjoy my hobby as a musician on my own time.

13. I always wanted to be in the military. I come from a military family and I did serve in the army from 2005-11.

    First and foremost I wanted to be a fighter pilot. You need good grades to do that. They don’t just let dummies become pilots. I never tried in school and looking back on it it was a fear of failure.

    So my next choice was to be an infantryman. I knew I wanted to do something exciting. So I decided I wanted to be an officer. Well, I fell into the same pitfall in college that I did in high school. I let it intimidate me and failed out. So I joined the army and still became an infantryman, a paratrooper even. While in the army I had the opportunity to try out for special forces. At the last minute I dropped out and didn’t even try.

    I had a successful career in the army. Always got promoted early, was put into leadership positions. I just always doubted myself and figured I lucked out with my success.

    When I got out I was very intimidated by college. I just thought I was dumb. Between my experiences in high school and college and always being called dumb (everyone is called dumb) in the army. I legitimately thought I was stupid. But I showed up to class, turned in my assignments, studied. I did well, ended up graduating with honors.

    And now somehow I ended up becoming a fireman. Don’t get me wrong, I like my job well enough. I can’t imagine myself doing anything else. But now I’ll always wonder what I could have achieved if I just applied myself. As I’ve gotten older I’ve realized that just about anything I put my mind to I can accomplish. All it takes is focus. Despite liking my job I’ll always wonder how my life would have been different had I learned to apply myself in school when I was younger.

14. I’m 34 and expecting my first child. I’ve always wanted to be a firefighter or join the Air Force, I’ve decided that the Air Force would be a better option because of a 4-6 year contract. I’m coming to terms that in the next few years I might have to decide on a second child (which I would really want) or Air Force.

15. For many years I wanted to learn to play the banjo and complete an ironman (not at the same time) but now I’m at peace with not doing either.

16. I always wanted to fly, and I was given a contract by the military and went into flight training for about 3 years. Hated every second of it.

    Finally admitted to myself that my dream was for the respect of others and not for myself. I left the flight pipeline and became an administrative officer, which I actually like much better then flying.

    I guess it wasn’t what you were looking for, but I thought my whole life I would love it. Started actually doing it, and found my dream didn’t match reality, but I didn’t want to admit it. Finally was honest with myself and left. I suppose my only “regret” is it is a lot cooler to tell someone you are a pilot, and hear the millions of questions that pour out of their mouth, then telling someone I’m essentially the HR equivalent in the military.