My Dream Book

So a couple months ago Andrew showed me this book called "My Dream Book" from Ameriprise financial. The book asks you questions about what you would like to have in your life in the future. I have started to believe more in the last couple of years that when you write something down it helps you to visualize it and makes you more likely to attain those goals. So here's my dream book.





1. What have you seen that you wish to achieve?


-Economic freedom


-positive credit score with no bad debt


-Assets


- a home


-A Master's degree in Public Health


-The ability to travel abroad often


- Founding a worship centered gospel group that ministers truly to people even when it's not popular


-A healthy and romantic partnership that is mutually fulfilling and encouraging


- Parenthood


- Healthy and mutually fulfilling friendships


-A deeper understanding of God


- A deep spiritual connection with my faith


-Loving those who are important to me completely





2. What do you want to avoid?


-Making important decisions quickly


-Not appreciating the people who mean the most to me


-Becoming stagnant in life


-Becoming professionally irrelevant


- Never loving completely


-Making poor financial decisions


-Choosing not to communicate solely for the purpose of avoiding conflict


-Being too selfish


-Allowing myself to become so busy that I miss what's really important.





3. What do I look most forward to doing?

Hobbies- singing, founding a worship centered gospel group with the purpose of ministering to people through song even when it isn't popular, Acting, Working in theatre

Volunteer work- working in ministry

Learning-pursuing higher degrees

Career-I would like to have a position in HIV prevention and education where I have the freedom to

A. Speak to and affect my community freely

B. Organize others around HIV prevention

C. Do all of this while representing a government entity or CBO

Relaxing and Enjoying Life

A. Reading and Writing More about my experiences

- Starting a journal and continuing my blog

B. Traveling internationally as many times as possible. At least once but if there are more opportunities that present themselves I want to take them. Travel must not be in Canada.

-Once I meet this goal I want to continue to take one trip out of the country every year.

C. Partner

-Cooking classes, dance classes, book clubs, hiking with friends, honest conversations, healthy conflic w/ oppenness to work through it.

D. Family

-Parents and family are far away so I want to have the ability to see them once a year in some way. Either by flying them to Seattle or flying to them.

E. Friends

-Coordinonate events with friends, plan hiking trips, have honest conversations, have healthy conflict and work through them.

F. New Friends

-open to new friends and as they come I'm open to them.

4. Where do you dream of going?

Destination

A. Anywhere outside of the US and Canada

B. South Africa

C. Brazil

D. Costa Rica

E. Hong Kong

F. Thailand

G. Trips to see family

5. How do you want to travel?

By plane, and comfortably

6. How much traveling do you want to do ?

A. twice per year

- Once to visit family

-Once for myself

7. Who do you want to travel with?

-Friends, Family and partner

8. Where do you see yourself living

A. Stay in the area

-I am going to continue living in Washington state, buliding a life for myslef with a partner and good friends.

B. Move Closer to family

- I am not going to move closer to my family but I want to be in a financial position to get to them quickly if i have to.

C. Change your Lifestyle

-I have always wanted to do some type of service work abroad. I have particularly thought about doing HIV prevention work in Sub-saharan Africa.

D. Relocate near activities you love

-I have this here in Seattle

9. How do you intend to stay healthy and active?

A. Physical Fitness

- I am going to gain more muscle mass

-I am going to temporarily hire a personal trainer in the next 12 months who can teach me a few more things about building muscle in a healthy way.

B. Mental Fitness

-I am going to write a series of books loosely based on my life.

-I am goingto read 1 book per month

-I am going to have more focused prayer and meditation

C. Health Care

-I am going to make sure I am using my health care for preventive care to help keep my long-term health care costs down.

10. How do you want to make your lasting mark?

A. Family

-children, siblings, parents, friends, pets

-I am going to make sure they all know how much I love them and how I would do anything in my power for them.

B. Charities or Causes

- I want my passion for HIV prevention to live on.

-I want my spiritual desire for honest worship and praise to live on.

11. Do you have a passion in Life? What is it?

12. If you could do anything you want, time and money aside whould would it be?

A. I would sing and use my ministry through song to affect issues that are important to me...ie HIV, and oppression.

13. If you had five years left to live how would you spend those years?

A. Making sure the people I love know how much they mean to me.

B. Travelling

C. Laughing

D. Singing

E. Loving

F. Living the most I can the best I can in the time I have.

14. How would your answer differ if you had 30 years to live?

-It wouldn't differ it just wouldn't feel as rushed. All the goals would be spread out further.

Dreams-

Specific, Time Bound, Actionable, Relevant

Dream #1

What do you want to achieve?

-I want to get into graduate school and complete the program I choose.

By When? Set a Deadline.

-I want to begin by Fall of 2010.

What action steps do you need to take?

-I need to make sure I am financially able to go to graduate school

- I need to research programs and find the one that is correct for me and what I want to do professionally.

-I need to make sure I have everything I need to get accepted into a program

By When? Set a Deadline.
-I want to begin by Fall of 2010.
What action steps do you need to take?
-I need to make sure I am financially able to go to graduate school
- I need to research programs and find the one that is correct for me and what I want to do professionally.
-I need to make sure I have everything I need to gain acceptance into a program
Dream #2What do you want to achieve?

I want to travel internationally

By When? Set a Deadline

Before December 31st 2009

How much will it cost?

$2500

What Action Steps do you need to take?

1. Create a budget.

2. Save money properly so I can take a good trip.

3. Research the most economic trip to fit my budget.

4. Be diligent in making this trip happen.

To keep yourself on track why is it relevant?

There is more to this world we live in than the things I have seen in my 27 years. I want to see and experience as much of this amazing world I live in as possible. There are great experiences I have right here at home but I also want to expand those experiences by seeing more of what is out there in this creation we live in.

So at this stage I am going to leave my dream book as is. This is a living document and I want to leave it that way. I need to think more about ways I want to word some more of my dreams but I will definitely add more to my number of dreams.

Keep Dreaming,

A.M.M.A