One of the greatest benefits of focusing on your passions in life, is you get to see creativity and artistry everywhere you look. Nature is a perfect example of artistry at work, with purpose and intent. The flowers, the trees, the ocean, even the leaves blowing restlessly in the wind, all seem to serve a distinct purpose.

Suddenly you see people in a whole new way and you begin to wonder, what is their passion? What are their dreams? Do they know what they long for and intend to bring about in their lives? Do they even know how?

Here’s the funny part, a lot of people don’t know what their passion is and thinking about a dream they may have, seems as foreign as believing in fairy tales and being rescued by a man on a white horse. And still, at some time in all of our lives, we dreamed of far away places to travel, saving the planet from destruction, being the president, or a painter, or a business owner, or a dancer, or an artist… well you get my drift. We all had dreams when we were kids and if you are living out your dreams, than kudos to you and to the people around you who support and encourage you to take a risk on yourself and live BIG and Out Loud!

But I know some people who didn’t get that kind of encouragement and so it is a struggle to find out where their creative passions reside, and where to find that quiet voice that sings the siren song that is their dream? A woman told me recently that she imagined her life, “like it was a painting, and I was a talented artiste’, and I just colored in the life I wanted to have until I had created the masterpiece that is my life.”

It sounds so simple and so wonderful, but how do you begin to know what to put on the canvas? What are the rules and what if you, gasp, make a mistake? What do you leave out or even worse, what do you put in? What if your dreams are not practical but instead are fanciful?  What if you believed in the possibilities of your dreams?

Well, here’s the good news, it is your masterpiece you are creating, your one life,  there are no wrong answers. You must do two things however, and it is nonnegotiable, you are required to tell yourself the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Then  tell a few friends or family that you trust and who will encourage and support you, and then you have to go to the edge of the cliff, look out over the horizon, take a deep breath and Jump!

Yup, I said it, Jump! If there is a dream inside of you that keeps whispering in your ear, “try this,” and you keep ignoring it, well it is indeed, time to jump! If the dream always comes back and nags you, beseeches you, and you keep thinking of all the reasons why it you can’t make the dream come true, STOP!

Challenge yourself to think of a few reasons that it might come true and then step, dear friends out on faith. If you have had a dream for your life and you’re not living it, it is time to make it happen. There are no dreams too big or too small, it is all about you, what do you see on your life’s canvas?

I want to encourage everyone to live their lives on their own terms, painting in the places and people and things that you want to see in your life, coloring your canvas. You see, if you’ve heard this dream whispering in your ear over and over, time and time again, it just may be because it is your purpose in this life, your destiny to make this dream a reality.

Friends, please consider this, it is quite possible that it is something only you can do in your time here on earth.  Why else would you have the same thought, “If only I could….” if you weren’t supposed to get about doing just that? Somewhere deep down inside of you is the artist waiting to paint your life just the way you imagine it, don’t you think it is time to grab a brush?