A BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) is a dream – but not an impossible dream. In fact by definition it is possible – but not probable. Do you have a personal BHAG?
I wonder how many people simply give up their dreams because they tell them selves that they are too ‘old’ too ‘poor’ or not clever enough to reach their dreams.
To turn dreams into reality will take a degree of risk taking, it may take giving up a fear of failure (or looking bad).
To achieve any dream it takes a first step, then a second and a third – until finally a dream is your new reality.
Dreams can be small or large – they might be held in a bucket list or dream catcher – but one day that list needs to get started on.
Imagine my delight at sharing the celebration to launch friend, Deborah Hutton’s new book – ‘My love affair with food’.
This cookbook has been on Deborah’s one day, some day, may be list….for more than fifteen years and finally she took a step, then another until it was done.
Now we all get to share her joy, her inspiration, her passion – she has been prepared to give up her fear to live her dream – she has ticked something off her list and in so doing shared her joy with others.
And I personally have delighted in that joy– getting back into the kitchen last weekend to make a cream of zucchini soup, a rhubarb and quince cobbler and a lamb rack to delight over.
At the launch I happened to be chatting to Ita Buttrose – who I have met now a number of times on Studio Ten… and I shared that I learned to cook from the ‘Women’s Weekly cookbook’s’. Her eyes lit up – “Oh yes’ she reminisced with fondness, “all those years ago when I started the now institutional ‘Women’s Weekly’ cookbook series”. She talked of the millions of books sold and how it introduced Australian homes to ‘exotic’ and traditional cooking – the Chinese cookbook was one of the best sellers. In the late 1970s this style of cooking was very new.
Ita’s dream also influenced a whole generation to explore food and to cook at home. These cook books were the first big colourful books that were affordable for every home.
You see when you start on your dream you never know who else you are going to inspire on their dream to.
Take a step to Live What You Love. – Congratulations Deborah on yours.
*It was Dale Wasserman who penned those words for the 1960s play Man of La Mancha – and they are absolutely relevant today in our career and life.
This article first appeared in LinkedIn in April 2015