The Day You Realize You're Living Someone Else's Dream (Part I)

And what happens when you finally start listening to your own

By my teens, I was dreaming of a house like this. What was your dream?

Dear Friend,

It begins so innocently that you hardly notice.

You're born into this world whole, curious, and content. Everything is immediate—the wonder of a baby mobile, the warmth of a parent's smile, the softness of your dog's fur against your little cheek. There is no sense of striving and no sense of lacking. Everything is abundant and alive.

But slowly, and without warning, it creeps in.

Before language, you sense that belonging, love, and safety are conditional. Eat your food. Don't complain. And definitely don't whine. Spontaneity gives way to a growing awareness that approval must be earned and that your value depends on your behavior rather than something intrinsic and fixed.

You pick up on subtle cues, such as a smile when you achieve something or a frown or silence when you fail to meet an unknown expectation. Over time, it becomes clear: who you are is not enough. Your worth is determined by what you do and achieve.

When you are old enough to string sentences together, you have already absorbed the unspoken rules. Good grades are not only encouraged, they are also seen as evidence of your goodness, intelligence, and potential. Praise is given for compliance rather than curiosity. Recognition is offered not for who you are but for how well you align with others’ expectations.

You learn to adapt your natural impulses to the environment to avoid the shame and guilt of stepping outside the lines.

You play it safe and strive to be agreeable, worthy, and not needy. You suppress your doubts and fears because you want to fit in and don't want to disappoint others. Your dreams of adventure, exploration, and creativity conflict with the desire to be worthy of success and admiration, and they are viewed through the lens of conditional worth.

Without being told directly, you learn that happiness is not something you are born with but must be earned. Thus, you look to the future, convinced that if you work hard enough, achieve enough, and sacrifice enough, you will finally realize the life you were meant to live, free of all limitations.

“When I was young, it seemed that life was so wonderful

A miracle, oh, it was beautiful, magical

And all the birds in the trees, well they'd be singing so happily

Oh, joyfully, oh, playfully watching me

But then they sent me away to teach me how to be sensible

Logical, oh, responsible, practical

And then they showed me a world where I could be so dependable

Oh, clinical, oh, intellectual, cynical”

—Roger Hodgson, Supertramp

Call to Adventure

As you transition into adolescence, the subtle lessons of childhood become more concrete and demanding. The assumptions that once felt light now bear the weight of expectation, serving as a roadmap for how your life will unfold.

Through words and glances, report cards and dinner conversations, you learn a formula that promises security and happiness if you are willing to work hard and delay gratification long enough—your future hinges on your ability to sacrifice the means for the end. You must excel in school and achieve good grades, leading to acceptance into colleges, good jobs, and a fulfilling life.

Initially, the path seems simple, almost comforting in its clarity.

All you have to do is keep walking it. But deep inside, there is a vague uneasiness that the life you are expected to pursue may not satisfy your heart’s longing. So you push aside those feelings, compelled by the potential rewards and the confirmation of your sense of worth.

You envision an exciting career, a big house, a marriage that proves you are lovable and loved, and vacations to places you have only dreamed of. Questioning these images would risk everything: your parents’ approval, your teachers’ pride, your peers’ praise, and your hope of achieving lasting happiness.

And so, without realizing it, you accept the invitation. You set out to become somebody who matters and is worthy of respect and admiration. The curious, spontaneous playfulness with which you came into the world fades away, replaced by great discipline and striving. Your days are measured in tasks completed, goals achieved, and recognition earned.

You tell yourself that the rewards of freedom, contentment, and fulfillment will come once you realize your dream life. But beneath the surface lies the voice you were born with, the spontaneity of awe and wonder.

Refusal of the Call

At first, your life unfolds as expected. You’re doing everything you’re supposed to and garnering all the milestones and accolades, confirming that you’re on track.

There are grades to earn, internships to secure, recommendations to gather, and achievements to include on your resume that, if crafted carefully enough, promise to open all the right doors. Yet the parties, friendships, and fleeting moments of laughter are tainted by an invisible pressure, a need to appear successful, well-adjusted, and sought after.

You keep moving forward because that’s what everyone else is doing. Moments of doubt creep in when you’re alone, in the silence after the excitement fades and the recognition dwindles. The goal is achieved, only for the satisfaction to vanish as quickly as it appeared. You wonder if your life is genuinely yours, whether the dreams you pursue are truly yours, or if they were handed down to you when you were too young to question.

You dismiss these doubts, telling yourself everyone feels this way sometimes.

You remind yourself how lucky you are and criticize yourself for being ungrateful. After every stage or promotion, you reassure yourself that true happiness will come after you finish building your dream life. You remind yourself that nothing great is achieved without persistence and perseverance.

And so you soldier on. You silence the deeper questions not with answers but with busyness. You distract yourself with plans and goals, convincing yourself that the weight you feel is simply the price of success. There is no time for reflection, no space for uncertainty, and no tolerance for anything that might threaten the carefully constructed vision of success you are trying to manifest.

And so, the voice inside you—the one that still remembers what it felt like to be free without needing to prove anything—becomes quieter and quieter until it's a faint whisper.

Crossing the Threshold

Eventually, the momentum becomes too great to resist.

You graduate with a diploma, carrying the hopes of your family and community and the quieter hopes you have for yourself. Your real life is about to begin, and everyone is excited for you. Your future is so bright that you “gotta wear shades.”

You get your first “real” job, with a title, benefits, and a vague promise of upward mobility. The office is drab, and the tasks are mostly uninspiring, but you have to start somewhere on the ladder to success. You learn which parts of yourself are welcome and which to hide. You smile and nod at the correct times, compartmentalize your feelings, and are carefully polite and strategically enthusiastic.

Work consumes your days, offset by evenings and weekends, meant to provide the balance that seems forever out of reach.

You tell yourself that the grind is temporary and fantasize about relaxing after the next promotion, raise, or job change. You begin to acquire the symbols of adulthood: a decent apartment, a newer car, and a growing savings account. With each acquisition comes a small, fleeting hit, a momentary feeling that you are moving in the right direction and becoming an adult.

But the highs fade quickly, replaced by a growing awareness that life consumes you faster than nourishes you.

Yet you wave away this realization as if it were an annoying mosquito, a restless sleep, or a lingering cold. You believe that better planning, organization, or greater productivity can solve anything. You keep moving. Otherwise, you’ll fall behind because staying busy is easier than stopping and asking whether the destination is yours. Besides, from the outside, your life looks exactly as you imagined.

Tests, Allies, and Enemies

The years fly by.

You build your life, piece by piece, believing that if you strive and achieve enough, you will eventually feel the satisfaction that always seems just out of reach. There are promotions to chase, relationships to nurture, debts to manage, and responsibilities that multiply until they overwhelm your daily life.

You work harder, thinking that more effort will bridge the gap between where you are and where you should be by now. You buy nicer furniture, upgrade your car, find a slightly larger apartment, or even purchase your first home. Each milestone temporarily enhances your sense of self and makes you feel like a somebody.

Weekends transform into rituals of recovery and reward. You indulge in experiences that make the grind worthwhile: dining at new restaurants, enjoying weekend getaways, and treating yourself to small luxuries under“self-care.” You justify the spending because you deserve it, and because somewhere deep inside, you are attempting to purchase the feeling of joy that you haven’t experienced since childhood.

As you scroll through social media’s endless feeds of smiling faces and carefully curated lives, you silently compare your inner feelings to everyone else’s external appearances.

You interpret your growing dissatisfaction as a sign that you haven't achieved, optimized, or become enough. You’re convinced that the answer lies in more: more goals, more hustle, more productivity, more improvement.

So you double down on the efforts that drain you, hoping for different results. You push yourself harder at work, follow productivity hacks, and start a side hustle for extra income. You consume advice and inspiration through podcasts, videos, and articles, hoping to address the growing sense of emptiness.

You experience rare moments of the joy you once knew, perhaps triggered by a song, a memory, or an unexpected kindness. Yet, these moments are fleeting, quickly swallowed up by the next project, the next bill, and the next item on a never-ending to-do list. Without realizing it, you begin to equate survival with success. You tell yourself that exhaustion is normal, that busyness is a badge of honor, and that it will all be worth it someday.

But quietly, invisibly, the cracks are beginning to form.

The Ordeal

At first, there’s a quiet dissatisfaction, the kind you think you can sleep off or make disappear with another round of beers, weekend plans, or a new set of goals. But over time, the feeling deepens. What was once a faint background hum becomes a constant drumbeat, an ache you can no longer ignore.

You look around—your career, possessions, bank account, relationships—and for a moment, you feel utterly disoriented, as if you have stepped into someone else’s story without realizing it. You walk through the rooms of your home, sit at your kitchen table, glance at the face across from you, and the words of David Byrne float up unbidden, cutting through the silence: “And you may tell yourself, this is not my beautiful house. And you may tell yourself, this is not my beautiful wife.”

You remember your dreams of freedom, adventure, and spontaneity. You realize, with grief, how far you have drifted from your true self and original hopes. You followed the script and did everything you were supposed to do. Yet, you still feel overwhelmed, exhausted, and dead inside, wondering how the promise of a beautiful life turned into this strange, persistent sense of emptiness.

You remind yourself to be grateful for all the riches in your life.

However, gratitude does not erase the aching sense that something essential has been lost—something you cannot easily name, but whose absence colors everything with a dull shade of dissatisfaction. You start to wonder if the problem lies within you, whether you’re genetically inclined to chronic anxiety and depression. Or perhaps you lack what it takes.

You consider everything you have been told will help: Wake up earlier, hustle harder, be more positive, move more, declutter, do cold plunges, start a morning routine, optimize sleep, meditate, journal, practice affirmations, and drink more water. You try some of them, perhaps all of them. And for a time, they work. For a time, you can persuade yourself that the right habit or mindset will finally connect the missing pieces.

But the nagging emptiness always returns.

Sometimes it comes when you least expect it, in the quiet moments between tasks and the lonely spaces between conversations. It returns not to punish you, but to remind you of a truth you have spent years trying to outrun: The life you were taught to want is not the life that will satisfy your heart.

For the first time, you realize that no amount of doing—no title, possession, or validation—can ever take the place of being.

Until part II,

Ryan

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Astra, a Husky mix, has a regal stare fit for a painting hung above the fireplace of a British estate.