I was listening to a song recently and one line caught my attention:
“Everything they dreamed of was still within reach.”
It made me think about my passion for being fit and healthy.
When we’re young, almost every dream feels possible. We dream about careers, travelling the world, learning new skills, climbing mountains, running marathons, raising a family, or simply living a long and adventurous life. Whether those dreams come true or not, they all seem within reach.
Without you realising, as you get older, your list of dreams gradually gets shorter.
Sometimes that’s because of circumstances. More often, though, it’s because of our health.
If you lose your mobility, certain dreams disappear. If you become frail, travelling becomes harder. If climbing a flight of stairs leaves you exhausted, climbing a mountain probably won’t happen. Your health can quietly remove your opportunities long before you realise it is happening.
It isn’t just the big adventures either. It could be playing football with your grandchildren, walking the South West Coast Path, dancing at a family wedding. or spending a day exploring a new city on holiday. These are dreams too, even if we don’t think of them that way.
This is one of the reasons I’m so passionate about exercise. People often think fitness is about looking better in the mirror. I think it is more about keeping your dreams alive.
Every time you exercise, every time you build a little more strength or improve your fitness, you’re keeping your list of dreams alive. You’re increasing the chances that, ten or twenty years from now, you’ll still be able to say yes when an opportunity comes along.
None of us knows what the future holds. Some dreams won’t happen, no matter how hard we try. But many of them are limited only by the condition of the body that carries us through life.
So don’t just chase your dreams, look after your body so that you are able to achieve them.
And don’t wait for the “right time”. Life is uncertain, and none of us knows how many opportunities we’ll have. If there’s something you’ve always wanted to do, start taking steps towards it today. Your future self won’t regret trying, but it may well regret waiting.
One day, you’ll look back and realise that the greatest gift wasn’t achieving every dream, it was having the health to keep dreaming.