When it comes to making important life decisions like choosing a career path, we’re often told to “follow your dreams” or to “dream big“. This is great advice, but in all honesty: it’s not really going to get you anywhere.
Don’t get me wrong, finding a career you can truly be passionate about is important. Planning the steps to achieve your goal is probably a smart idea too, but sometimes people get too caught up in the dreaming, the planning, the fantasy of what they want to become or do, that they never actually get around to doing it. If you really want something, then you’re going to have to put in hard work, and lots of it. That’s the part they usually don’t tell you. That’s the part that’s the least appealing. But that’s also the most crucial step to achieving your dreams.
Screenwriter, director, and producer Shonda Rhimes (Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal, How to Get Away with Murder) relays the message better than I could ever hope to. Check out the comic below to see some of the wisdom she shared while delivering her commencement speech at Dartmouth College this past June.
So stop talking about what you want to do, and do it. Go out there, put in the work, and make your dreams a reality.
SHONDA RHIMES: A screenwriter’s advice | ZEN PENCILS
