Not long ago, I met a couple who told me they were building their dream home. They said it was always their vision to live in a home just like this one where they were getting the keys. They were finally doing it. Of course, I was happy for them and couldn’t wait to see it.
We all have dreams and mine involve sewing projects more often than I’d like to admit. I’m also a big fan of enjoying my home and I’ve put a lot of effort into making my home comfortable.
My sewing space used to be the kitchen table in between meals. The time to clean up depended on when the next meal started. Sometimes, pizza in front of the television was my idea. I didn’t mind. I loved sewing in the middle of my family’s grand central station.
Then my sewing space migrated to a spot that didn’t require cleanup before every meal. That was nice, but it signaled the inevitable growth of the family.
Modified Dreams And Goals
My years of sewing in front of the family were marked by the frequency of my seam ripper coming out. My seam ripper, the enemy of my youth is now the old friend I count on to fix my problems.
My perspective changed over the years and I can see that happen in others as well. Now, I have an entire room devoted to my sewing and writing.
As I toured the couple’s new home, I smiled and congratulated them on a big achievement of finally getting the home of their dreams. At the same time, I felt a little sad for them.
Their new home was lovely. It was exactly like the homes on television design shows. It was exactly like the other 175 or so homes the builder was finishing. It was a typical home for people at our stage in life. It wasn’t special.
They’d been sold this dream home vision through marketing on television, magazines, and social media.
If they’d been told their dream home was purple, they’d have said purple walls were their longstanding vision of a dream home. If they’d been told their dream home was yellow, that would’ve become their longstanding vision of the perfect dream home.
Personally, I like that builders are making available home designs that work better for me today. They are not my, emphasis on the word my, dream home though.
My first dream home existed when my kids lived at home with me laughing and doing all the things a family does. I’ve had that home and loved every minute of my kids growing up to become the adults I’m so proud of today.
Dreams Still On The Horizon
My second dream home is still on the horizon. Maybe it’ll always be on the horizon because my ideas of what I would like to do and accomplish change over time.
If I won the lottery tomorrow and could have my dream home today, it would not be in a typical middle-class neighborhood. I know it would be different than that, not necessarily bigger, just different.
Approximately 2,000 square feet in a ranch style home with a neighborhood pool to share and a mailbox stack that seems to never end in the middle of suburbia is not my dream home. It was my dream home when I raised my children in a home like this.
The point I want to make is that the couple I mentioned lost their sense of dreaming big or beyond the ideas of others, if they ever really had it.
The couple left the dreaming and imagining what could be to developers and their marketing team. The couple no longer decides what they want. Instead the couple accept and adopt what they are told they want in a home.
I dream big. I dream beyond. I think you should, too.
Thinking of a Sewist Side Hustle is going beyond and thinking bigger than what we’re told to think we should do or want for ourselves. You’re already started down the path of more. You’ve shown that you think with a little more ambition and creativity than most.
I wonder what you could do if you let yourself go one more step beyond the typical. What if your dream was more than being like all the others on television, magazines, and social media? What if your idea caught the attention of other people instead of blending into the mix?
It’s okay to want more and to go for it. You should. Develop your vision and work on it. Then, develop it more and work on it again. That’s how you turn your side hustle into your thing full-time.
Sewist Side Hustle 