I come from a middle class working family, always wearing hand-me-down clothes, as my parents sometimes struggled to pay the bills. A big night out for our family was a monthly visit to the local Golden Coral, Sonny’s BBQ, or Godfathers Pizza. You know what, I thought we were doing well as a family, after all the son of a police man and my mom owned a cleaning service, meaning we scrubbed toilets as kids, all four of us did. So it is but fitting that today, my mom is a successful real-estate entrepreneur. Mom is an over achiever and our parents raised four over achievers, failure was not an option in our family, we were raised to love God first and work hard second, we were raised to be winners, with a go get’em personality has always been a tone setter for me, and now three books later with my newest book just launching two weeks ago I am finding that the best is still yet to come. I am not one who allows anyone to derail me off my tracks; I pretty much always stick to my guns. Instead of moaning and complaining, over my bad situations I have always looked for the sliver lining and found something good inside the worst of situations. I feel we have to take that energy, when problems happen, and put it towards taking us to the next level.
I mean lets be honest, I am a divorced father of three beautiful children, one girl and two boys, and the truth was I was dazed and confused many times in my adult life. I just never ever quit. My first big break was CSN (Christian Sports Network). I have been in almost every, NCAA Locker-room, roamed the sidelines in both NCAA and NFL football games, In every NFL locker room you can think of, every Major League Club house, and played every Major Golf course in the country. I have spent more time in Airplanes then most people spend in cars. But there is a way to get here, and there are great sacrifices that get made with everyone and every thing. Trust me when I say, when you make up you’re mind to step out on a limb, you’re friends and family will constantly shoot you’re idea down in most cases, and they will even talk bad about you as if your are an idiot, they sure have me. I have been ran in the dirt and talked about like a pure dog by people who are supposed to love me? All because I would not be moved from what I believe was best for me. I have stared every kind of adversity right square in the face, and yet here I stand, tall and confident and believe me I am far from done. I have not even scratched the surface yet, for me, the best is yet to come. So I said all of that to say this. If you are sitting on the fence with your dream, I would like to encourage you and say; “Go for it my friends”! Go get yours, after all you only live once.
Don’t allow anyone to steal your dream just because they think they know what is best for you? Only you know you, and you know what is best for you. “If you have a dream”,it is personal, and you should go after it, even if you may not achieve it, you will learn so much about your-self in your journey. I mean really, we only get one life time and we are not even guaranteed tomorrow, so why not go for it? Who cares what your friends and family say, they are just jealous because you have the guts to go for it and you’re not afraid to fail. They are secretly hoping that you will fall on your face so they can say” see I told you so” to anyone who will listen. They are cowards, and this is how they make them self’s feel better. So who cares what they think” Most of all, you don’t need their approval anyway. There are a multitude of dream thieves in our life, but one of the major thieves that work to steal the God-given dreams of men and women is one's family and friends.
If your dream can survive the onslaught of lies you hear through time, the devil, and your friends, then the final challenge is usually the most difficult and often times painful, because it comes from your family. Time passes, the devil's voice can be rebuked and silenced, and you can tell your friends good-bye, but your family is with you for your entire life. You grow up loving them, and you deeply desire their love and approval. To continue to love and respect your family, and to obey God at the same time, is not often an easy task. At times it is like walking a tight rope, but you pray and believe to God that one day they will receive you just as you are, and not who they think you are or who you should be to fit their personal agenda or approval. My family and friends has seen me take enough leaps of faith in my life that they have reached a point where they no longer question me if I choose to tell them my plans. But the fact is that when you first begin to hear from the Lord and take some radical steps to follow His Word, your family—because they love you—will question your judgment. As they voiced doubt after doubt, I kept thinking, "It isn't like I'm giving up a whole lot here!" Still, it was a great step of faith for me at the time, and it was difficult to handle the uncertainty voiced by my family.
These are the particular "dream thief’s" is much more personal and sensitive, because my family has watched me grow up in the natural. More than anyone, they know my faults and my weaknesses, and when I announce, "Thus saith Donnie," they always tried to explain away my dream by my downfalls. They would try to convince me that I was compensating for my inadequacies by living in a fantasy world, instead of facing my problems realistically and living life like others do. That just did not fly with me and it still doesn’t today. What we must always remember is that all of the different types of dream thieves will come to us with an element of truth: I do have an ego that likes to exalt myself above others; yes, friends, I am making some major changes in my life and I don't recognize myself at times; and yes, family, I admit to these faults and weaknesses."
However, I have faced head-on the accusations and uncertainties voiced by these dream thieves, my friends and family who think they know me better then I know my self, and you know what? By sticking to my guns, I don’t have to say one word; they are all watching things unfold just like the rest of the world. No matter how long it takes; no matter how many times I have to tell the myself to hang in there and to not give up, no matter how many friends call me a nut and forsake me, and some of you reading this blog and who are supposedly my friends are the very ones who sit on the sidelines and run our mouth about me and others because you lack the courage to try. So you would rather watch the ones like me who do try, and hope we fail so you can talk ugly about us? But you know what, you can’t stop me, you haven’t so far and you won’t ever. I am too strong for you negative fair weather friends and family to allow you to get in my head, no matter how it hurts when my family and friends comes against my dream with their so called love for me—I hold fast to the vision God has placed in my heart! What takes precedence over every argument, what is most important, and what we should never lose sight of is that God has placed a vision, a dream, and a desire for our lives in our hearts. And Hebrews 10:23 admonishes us to "hold fast" to what God has spoken to us, not what our family or friends say. The bottom line is simple, I am not afraid to fail, I am afraid of not trying ~ Donnie Bolena
