Dreaming to fail or failing to dream?

Do you dream? And by dream, I don't mean dream when you sleep. What I'm really asking is: Do you dream when you're awake?

I must confess, I don't consider myself a natural born dreamer. My default position is one of pragmatism. When recently asked "What did Little Milton want to be when he grew up?" My first response was to list what I did not want to be: astronaut, fire-fighter, etc... Then I remembered one thing I did want to be: a hotel and hospitality magnate. I absolutely loved hotels as a little kid. I also loved water parks. Nothing seemed more appropriate than to one day change one letter in the "Hilton" signs all around the world. 

Thinking back, even this pragmatist knew how to dream as a kid. I didn't consider how feasible it was to become a hotel magnate. Instead, I just focused on what I wanted to do. Sadly, as we get older, we tend to forget how to dream. While some of that is definitely for the better, the downside is that we often end up failing to dream. And the result is that our current reality and our future realities are limited by our failure to dream.

What if we could regain some of that child-like-ness in our lives as adults? What if we could start dreaming to fail instead of failing to dream? When I say dreaming to fail, I don't mean dreaming only to fail. What I mean is dreaming big enough that:

• A community is required to realize the new reality.
• The beneficiaries are beyond just yourself and your immediate circle
• You expect to fail, the first time and probably the next few times. 
• Miracles are a requirement to reach your final reality

I think that's a bit of what the Scriptures were telling us about humanity when it says "Prosper! Reproduce! Fill Earth! Take charge!" in Genesis 1:28 (The Message). Humans were created to dream. To make something more out of what we've been given. When we fail to dream, we slowly shrivel up and lose a bit of ourselves, our humanity. Yet when we dream, and especially when we dream to fail, we take the first step towards living into our intended purpose to grow, to create and to prosper. Dreaming big will lead to failure. But failing to dream would be even worse, that would lead to death. So dare to dream, dare to be create... expect failure along the way, but don't be surprised if you also see God.