Dreamlining: New Experiences

Last year my hubby read a book called The 4-Hour Workweek. One of the chapters in the book was on dreamlining. Dreamlining is a process of achieving your goals and dreams. You start by brainstorming and writing down your goals/dreams for a set period of 6 or 12 months and you work towards achieving those goals. It's not simple things like keeping the dishes all washed or the laundry caught up. It's for more in depth goals and dreams (like moving, a vacation, getting a degree, a car, losing weight). You write down your goals: things you want to have (car, jewelry, new phone, computer), things you want to do (zipline, vacation, making an extensive family tree, running your first race, learning a new language), what you want to be (better chef/baker, photographer, etc). Next, pick 4 or 5 of those goals to work toward achieving in this dreamlining period. Research and write down the cost of those goals and work towards achieving those goals (for the more expensive goals, some options for obtaining them would be getting another job, setting aside bonuses, sell extra or unneeded  items on eBay/garage sales/Craigslist, etc.).

Some of our new experiences

For example, some of the items on our first dreamline (for 6 months) consisted of moving and being better parents. We achieved the moving goal, and are still working on some of the others. On our second dreamline, we chose to put on less items to help us achieve more of our goals. Between moving, work, and kids it can be hard to focus on too many goals/dreams. One of the main goals hubby wanted to achieve was to have more unique life experiences, which consisted of trying to have a new experience every day.

At first I was thought "Every day? How in the world are we going to experience something new everyday?" But, as hubby pointed out it didn't have to be something huge. It could be as simple as trying a new food or restaurant, finding a new playground, reading a new book. We have a notebook that we keep our goals written down in, as well as our progress. For the new experiences, we write each one down with the date so we can keep track. We just started the new dreamlining set, but it's been pretty cool to see our list grow.

Here are some of our new experiences:

• The boys cracked geodes with Grandpa. 
• I tried several new cake techniques and decorating ideas. 
• Higgins and I went to a food truck gathering and tried new foods. 
• As a family we went to a soccer game. 
• Another time we were walking and saw a seafood festival and decided to stop in for a new experience. While we were there, Bernardo got to ride a mechanical bull. If we hadn't been trying to have new experiences every day, we probably would have passed up the festival since the boys and I aren't big fans of seafood.
• Hot air balloon festival