Take the Time to Dream
Updated: Jul 22
Why busyness is where dreams go to die
A very good friend of mine who I have had the privelege of sharing that stage with many times John Maclean, asks a question that lands like a gentle punch:
“What happened to the little boy or girl that used to dream?”
It’s a fair question.
Somewhere between childhood and adulthood, we traded wonder for sensible. We swapped possibility for practical. We stopped asking “what if?” and started asking “what’s safe?”
Steve Jobs built Apple around dreamers and misfits. But in most systems, dreamers are misfits - at least until others catch the dream.
The Architecture of Lost Dreams
Sir Ken Robinson spent years documenting how our education systems prioritise safety and sensibility over creativity and possibility. We design for compliance, not contribution. For execution, not exploration.
And if we’re honest, this doesn’t stop at school gates. It extends into our parenting, our leadership, our organisational cultures. We’ve built systems that reward the sensible and sideline the dreamers.
But I wonder if there’s a simpler reason we forget how to dream: we get caught up in living, and the speed of life eliminates the space where dreams emerge.
Here’s what neuroscience tells us: dreams require what researchers call “constructive internal reflection” - the mental space to imagine futures that don’t yet exist (Immordino-Yang et al., 2012). This capacity doesn’t happen during task execution. It requires rest, wandering attention, and unstructured time.
Dreams require pause. And pause is the first casualty of busyness.
“The proof of being alive is that you’re still dreaming - not daydreaming, but the disciplined practice of envisioning a future worth building and believing you have a part to play in creating it.”
The Balance Between Vision and Execution
Here’s the tension: you don’t have the luxury of just dreaming. You have to deliver. Performance reviews. Capability programs. Culture change. The list doesn’t stop.
So what’s the balance?
Here’s what I’ve learned from leaders who hold both well: always dream, and build the system to execute.
Dreams without structure become fantasies. Hope without action becomes what Kegan and Lahey (2009) call “competing commitments” - we say we want change, but our systems are perfectly designed to maintain the status quo.
The most effective leaders aren’t choosing between vision and execution. They’re holding both in rhythm. They pause to dream. They build the habits to make it real.
This isn’t soft leadership. It’s the disciplined integration of aspiration and action.
The Question You’re Avoiding
So here’s my challenge, borrowed from John’s provocation:
What happened to the dreamer in you?
When did you stop believing that more is possible? When did you settle for managing operations instead of reimagining how humans could flourish at work?
And more importantly: what would you attempt if you knew you were designed for more than maintenance mode?
Not “what would you do if you had more time or budget?”
But: what dream is sitting dormant in you, waiting for you to pause long enough to hear it again?
“You were designed to dream. The question is whether you’ll take the time to remember how.”
A Practice Worth Trying
Here’s mine: every day, I make choices that align with dreaming.
That means trying something new. Experimenting with possibility. Pausing long enough to ask: what have I been placed here to steward?
For me, it’s this: to see people live to their full potential. To help them believe in more than what they think they’re capable of.
That’s my dream. It’s too big for me to finish alone.
What’s yours?
References
Immordino-Yang, M. H., Christodoulou, J. A., & Singh, V. (2012). Rest is not idleness: Implications of the brain’s default mode for human development and education. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 7(4), 352-364.
Kegan, R., & Lahey, L. L. (2009). Immunity to change. Harvard Business Press.
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