It started with cereal and Kobe Bryant.
I was halfway through a bowl of Raisin Bran when a quote on a CNN documentary made me freeze—spoon in midair. Kobe’s former speech teacher was describing him. Not as a basketball icon, but as a person who gave himself fully to his craft—heart, soul, body. No holding back. No halfway effort. Just complete devotion.
That hit me.
Because that’s the essence I try to pour into my classroom, usually while waving my arms like a motivational windmill and occasionally knocking over a cup of markers. It’s what I believe in: being all in. But here’s the truth most motivational posters won’t tell you—living that way is terrifying.
The Risk in Going “All In”
The world loves to romanticize passion. Ancient thinkers revered it. Aristotle spoke of arete, a life of excellence. The Stoics taught inner resilience. Japanese samurai had Bushidō, and jazz musicians have long known that magic lives in improvisation, in surrendering to the moment.
But today? Our culture doesn’t always honor passion. It quantifies. It counts followers, downloads, monetization rates. Your worth is too often measured by data points, not dreams.
So what happens when your dream can’t be turned into a product? What if your purpose doesn’t fit inside an app, a business model, or a TikTok trend?
This is where the world begins whispering: “Be practical.”
And that whisper? It’s loud.
The Modern Dilemma: Passion vs. Paycheck
Young people hear, “Live with purpose!” one minute, then get asked, “But how will you monetize that?” the next. It’s enough to make anyone’s head spin. And somewhere in that spiral, you might start to believe the lie: Maybe dreams are only for people with financial safety nets.
But I want to tell you what I tell my students, often with too much volume and sometimes while standing on a desk: Your dream is not foolish. It is not naive. It is not a liability.
It’s a signal. A heartbeat. A clue to who you are and what matters to you.
Yes, chasing it is risky. It might not work out the way you hope. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth it.
When the Payoff Doesn’t Come
I’ve felt the sting of effort not rewarded.
I’ve made documentaries that barely saw the light of day. Written pieces I thought would shift something in the world—only to hear silence. Created programs that vanished once the funding dried up.
And still, I wouldn’t trade those experiences.
Why?
Because even when things didn’t “succeed” in the traditional sense, I found something more enduring: flow, purpose, presence.
I remember filming a sunrise in a remote Filipino village, fully immersed, or listening to a student stumble courageously into their own voice. In those moments, I wasn’t thinking about metrics. I was just there—alive, present, connected.
Redefining What “Success” Means
In a culture that markets mindfulness, brands stillness, and sells simplicity, we need to push back. We must redefine success not by what we produce, but by how we live.
Here’s what I tell the dreamers: Measure your life by the depth of your experience. By your willingness to risk. By the people you lift up. By the quiet moments that filled you with something real.
You don’t have to go viral to matter.
You can live a seemingly quiet life and still have an epic story unfolding inside you. You can dance, paint, teach, code, or write—not for fame or fortune, but for the joy of doing something that matters to you.
Yes, Doubt Will Come. Let It.
You’ll have doubts. I do. Some months, I wonder if I should’ve taken a more stable route. I’ve felt the weight of unpaid bills and questioned if chasing ideas was irresponsible.
But here’s the thing: the alternative—a life without creativity, without risk, without dreams—feels like a deeper loss.
Because we’re not algorithms. We’re not content factories. We are meaning-makers.
And the only way to make meaning is to show up—imperfectly, vulnerably, courageously.
The Real Gift: Being Fully Alive
So to every dreamer—whether you’re 18 or 80, just starting out or beginning again—I want you to hear this:
Don’t let the world’s cynicism shrink your vision.
Live mindfully—not just in stillness, but in action. In how you spend your time, what you say yes to, where you place your attention. Mindfulness doesn’t have to be peaceful. Sometimes, it’s showing up to chaos with both feet on the ground.
This isn’t about achieving constant serenity. It’s about contact—with the beauty, the struggle, the failure, the magic.
It’s about putting your whole self into this wild, wonderful gamble of living.
Show Up Anyway
You won’t always win. But that’s not the point. The point is that you showed up. Fully. Completely.
Like Kobe. Like every artist, athlete, teacher, and dreamer who said, “Yes” to the call—even when the road ahead was uncertain.
I’m not here to sell you a dream. I’m just someone who still gets chills when a student lights up with a new realization. I’ve seen enough to know: dreams won’t always pay in dollars. But they’ll pay in self-knowledge, in joy, in being awake to your own life.
And for me, that’s always been enough.
