Summary: I used to dream of being an Olympic figure skater. Outfitted in an asymmetric one-armed mini-tard, I cut a winning picture in my mind’s eye. Daring, lithe, and perfectly rehearsed, if only you could have seen me! I was in a class by myself—nailing high-altitude back flips, saucy kick splits, executing mesmerizing double triple axles in time to the music. The crowd roared through my performances every time and littered the rink with long-stemmed roses well before my first bow. The thunderous response of my fans said it all: I was the only show on ice. And then, as the saying goes, “I woke up.” In truth, I’ve only been ice skating once in my waking life and it took everything in me to stay upright while making tracks around the rink. Despite my flawless routines and feats in dreamland, my weak ankles wanted no parts of it in ‘real life.’ The dream analyst in me says those repeated scenes were messages from my subconscious telling me I was really good at skating around my issues and that, no matter how good I got at it, I’d eventually have to step out of the act and get on with it if I really wanted to live out loud, which I did. As it was, I was skating on thin ice in more than a few areas of my waking life and I knew it. I also dreamed of being a professional singer. But, unlike my sleeping prowess as an ice dancer, for a time I actually was living the dream of being paid to entertain audiences in song. I pretty much spent the nineties gigging my way through New York with my jazz band. You name it, we played it—indoors, outdoors, rooftops, basements, weddings, clubs, cabarets, gardens, holes in walls, we were there. I backed up reggae bands, neosoul vocalists, and rock groups when they called. Whether we were playing to packed rooms or to a lonely bartender and tired cocktail waitress slumped over a table in the back, it didn’t matter. After awhile, in another burst of awakening, I quit. Tiring of the big city hustle and seeing far too little cash in hand at the end of the night, and fearing I was frittering my life on a love that didn’t seem to love my back, I packed up my P.A. and called the whole thing off. While I still love to sing and do so on occasion, I don’t hold out hope of making it Big or of making it pay these days. That’s because there’s no more sure way to drain the life out of a love than by trying to wring money out of it. Having learned that, I finally saw I could still hold my music dear without forcing it to be the reason I got out of bed each day. If I’d known the freedom I’d feel from that, I probably would have moved on a lot sooner. But I doubt it. My point is this: sometimes it’s important, crucial even, to let go of the dream, or to stop clutching it and give it room to breathe and evolve, so that something else more suited and juicy can come through. And because it’s an immensely difficult thing to do, I don’t say that lightly. Letting go of something you've wrapped your heart strings around in a pretty little bow requires lots of introspection and courage. What’s more is you’ll have to call up a heap of fortitude when you’re left with the void created in the release. Not to worry though, because I’ve got just the thing to help you get acclimated to the task. Here’s great way prepare yourself for the experience of saying goodbye to a beloved dream—or job, or relationship, or living situation, or anything, really—that you suspect is going nowhere, in just three steps: 1. Have a baby. 2. Hand that baby over to a band of lawless marauding bandits. 3. Leave town and never look back. Because everything is energy, it makes sense that your unrealized, unacted-upon dreams and dusty old getting-around-to goals—or dream jobs, dream relationships, idealized living situations, or you-name-it again—they're are running on energy, too…yours. And because we’re human beings with finite physical resources, we’ve only got so much energy at our disposal at any given time,
