Mission Statement

DIY Fairy Tales is all about Inspiration

It’s about realizing human potential. How our potential is almost always barely tapped, and tapping it. How each and every one of us is capable of greatness and helping to make that greatness a reality.

If we did all the things we are capable of, we would literally astound ourselves. -Thomas Edison

Why is it that we so often settle for so much less?

Why do we listen to the voices of our fears?

The you can’t do it, you’re not good enough, the cost is too high. The after your dreams fail, what then? And my favorite, the Do you really want to end up broke and homeless? I didn’t think so…

We’re not corporate automatons. We aren’t built to sit in a cubicle, or stare at a screen for 10 hours a day. We aren’t built to have one life for 40+ hours a week that drains our energies and weakens us to the point we can’t enjoy the things that really matter.

We evolved to recognize needs, determine solutions, hunt them down and kill or gather them… And then relax and enjoy our success. Wash, rinse, repeat.

We evolved to grow and improve. To make things better and explore new worlds.

For me, the Star Trek tagline has always seemed to fit pretty well with my dreams and I’ve modified it here for personal use.

My Life: My Ultimate Fairy Tale

These are the travels of one man
His lifetime mission
To explore strange new lands
To seek out new peoples and new civilizations
To boldly go where no Mathes has gone before.
To make a difference!

Our dreams don’t take the form of repetitive simple work. We may need some of that to realize our dreams, but the dreams themselves don’t take that form. No child dreams of growing up to work with Dilbert.

We dream of changing the world. Of having exciting adventures in exotic lands. Of bumping shoulders with great people and having some of their greatness rub off on us. We dream of the grandiose.

Do we read books and watch television to have those adventures in the safeness of our homes, and because we don’t think we can actually go out there and do those things ourselves?

Do you dream of

• Saving the world?
• Rescuing the beautiful princess from the clutches of the evil villain?
• Inventing something that stops the next ice age?
• Initiate world peace?
• Solve the mysteries of the universe?

Yeah those things are probably beyond your capabilities and mine, but the fact that we find them so exciting should tell us something. Those are the hyperbolic versions of our real dreams. You may not ever cure cancer, but maybe you could help thousands have access to safe drinking water? You may not solve the mysteries of the universe, but maybe you could introduce books to a remote community that allows the children to know those mysteries exist.

You might not save the princess from Mr. Evil, but maybe you could help change labor laws to allow hundreds or thousands of people to have dramatically better lives. Maybe you could teach english to a class of children who can then go on to great things. Maybe you climb Everest.

The trick is figuring out what part of those super grandiose dreams most appeals, translating that from fiction into possibilities, and then chasing it down and making it happen. The trick is recognizing what your real dreams are and making them happen.

When we walk the pathway to our dreams, we live a fairy tale. When we reach the climax of that fairy tale, it isn’t the end. Each dream realized gives hope to a multitude of others. Each book finished, yields a library.

Wouldn’t be awesome to realize that you have so many realistically pursuable dreams… So many possible fairy tales, that you can’t possibly have time for them all? That’s a pretty nice problem to have, and it’s entirely doable. In fact, I’ve discovered that even a little chasing of one dream, the starting of one fairy tale, produces that problem.

If you’ve ever read a “Build your own adventure” book. That’s what a fairy tale life feels like after a while. The more you walk the path, the more the world explodes with possibilities.

Making a Do It Yourself Fairy Tale requires almost nothing more than the courage and motivation start walking that path.

Can we turn the whole world into Fairy Tale land? Probably not, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do it with our own lives and the lives of those around us.

Why can’t we achieve those dreams? Why do so many of our lives have essentially no resemblance to our dreams? Even more importantly, why do we fear to dream?

Is it because we fear the dream itself, or do we fear the possibility of failure? What about the regret that comes from not realizing our dreams? What about the sense of failure that comes from having to live “ordinary lives” when our dreams are so much bigger.

Hence the phrase “Dare to Dream.”

So DIY Fairy Tales is all about not only daring to dream, but chasing that dream. Catching it, bagging it, and making it reality. Realizing the greatness of our own potential and not being limited by fear.

My mission, is to both live my own fairy tale, and to “Pay it Forward”. Enabling others to live their Fairy Tales and then in turn enabling others.

What are you waiting for, retirement?