How Dreams and Goals Can Give Your Life Direction
In my dream home by the ocean, the window in my writing room opens easily. One half has a screen to keep the bugs out. I can lean out of the other half to talk to someone outside.
Dreams and goals can give your life direction when you choose goals that reflect what gives your life meaning. My dream of writing by the ocean reminded me how much I want to help someone feel less alone. Preparing a talk for young people is one way I can live that purpose today. Try picturing an ordinary day in the life you long for. Which detail would you miss most, and what small goal could bring more of it into your life?
I got quite particular about that window while I was trying out a goal-planning exercise. I could have written “I want to live by the sea” and called it a day.
But I already live in Nova Scotia. There’s plenty of ocean here! What was I really longing for?
When I stayed with the picture a little longer, I found the words for it. I wanted time to follow a thought all the way to the end. I wanted the people I love to have good lives and capable people to call on. And when a thought turned into a story worth telling, I wanted the chance to write it down for someone who might need it.
That’s how I use dreams and goals to find direction. The dream gives me a picture of a day I would love to live. Inside that picture I can often find something meaningful enough to begin doing today.
My ideal dream, in my own words
Here’s a little of what I wrote after imagining myself about five years into the future.
My favorite books are within easy reach. My chair welcomes me into utter comfort. The tools I need work reliably at my fingertips. I can open my window to the breeze, with its fine screen keeping the insects outside. When I want solitude, I can close my door and settle into the deep quiet of my own space.
Here, I have time to follow a thought into the depth of its meaning.
A little farther along in my dream, I’m doing Tai Chi barefoot on the sand. Later I float on my back and let the gentle waves rock me. I might even take out a paddleboard. In my ideal arrangement, somebody else puts it away afterward. I’m rather fond of that detail, too.
As someone who has spent much of her life caring for others, I recognized what those small comforts meant to me. I feel the relief of being cared for, too. That sentence belongs in my dream just as much as the one about making a difference in the world. I ordered a framed print of the scene from staples for my bedroom. Thirty-one Canadian dollars felt like a fair price for a daily reminder of something it had taken me years to put into words.
How to find the meaning inside your own dream
Give yourself one ordinary morning in a life you’d love to wake up to. Where are you when you open your eyes? Stay there a moment. If you can feel the floor under your feet more easily than you can see the room, begin with that. If what comes to mind is the sound of someone laughing in the kitchen, follow the sound.
Then try finishing this sentence on paper: “The part I would miss most if you took it out of this picture is …”
Perhaps you pictured a beautiful kitchen and discovered that what you’d miss most was your sister sitting across the table. That tells you something a list of renovation goals could never tell you. You may still want the kitchen. You might also want to call your sister and invite her over for coffee in the one you have.
Some days even imagining next year feels like too much. You can make the question smaller. “What would I welcome a little more of tomorrow?” is plenty to write at the top of a page. A few minutes of company, an interesting book, or a morning with fewer demands can give you somewhere to begin.
Choose one goal that belongs to that life
I think of my whole dream as a mountain and my smaller goals as foothills. One foothill I’ve chosen is to prepare a talk for young people with a colleague who can speak from his own experience of gambling. I want to speak with enough ease to look up from my slides and see the students’ faces. And I want one young person, hearing a difficult story, to come away knowing there’s someone they can ask for help.
That last sentence is where my purpose lives. It also helps me decide what to do when I sit down at my desk. I can spend twenty minutes adjusting the colors on a slide. Or I can spend those twenty minutes talking with my colleague about what he most wants a student to remember. At this stage, I know which would bring us closer to the talk we want to give.
You can try the same thing with your own dream. Pick one detail you’d like more of in your life. Write down one action within your reach, when you’ll do it, and how you’ll know you’ve done it. If what you long for is time with your sister, “I’ll invite her for coffee on Saturday” gives you something you can do. Her answer is hers. Making the invitation is yours.
Later, give yourself a moment to ask two questions. Did I do what I said I would? And did it bring me closer to what I care about? I can check every box on a busy day and still long for ten quiet minutes at my desk. I want my goals to help me notice that while I can still do something about it.
A question to take with you
If you could keep just one detail from the life you pictured, which would you bring into tomorrow?
Write it down in words that sound like you. If you’d enjoy a little company as you explore it, I’ve gathered starting points on the resource page for My Daily Sparkle of Goal Achievement. And if several directions are tugging at you, you may also find a useful question in Finding Your Path.
For me, the ocean is still a dream. The words on this page are something I can offer you today. That part of the life I imagined is already mine to live.
Last Updated on November 5, 2026 by Dr. Christine Sauer
