Why have I been struggling for years?

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8 years ago

One man's dream became a revolution. He had been struggling for years. And was told by many to give it up.

A dogged persistence. Or call it determination. Others may say he was stubborn. But something had a hold of him. An obsession you could say. Martin Luther King said, "I have a dream". But actually, that dream had him. He was the vehicle for that dream.

But this man's dream woke him during the night. He found the answer to a perplexing problem in that dream. And now he could make that machine work.

In his dream, he was being chased through the jungle by a group of head hunters. He noticed something unusual about their spears. At the pointy end, was a hole. The spear end was somewhat flattened and had a hole in the widest part.

How peculiar to notice something like that when he knew it was his head they were after. But that was the point of the dream, pardon the pun.

He had been struggling for years with the hole at the other end to make this machine work. You see, he was trying to make something unconventional with a conventional method work. And failed again and again.

When woken, he sat upright in bed with pen and paper in hand. And his head still on his shoulders. He knew in that moment he had found the answer to his problem. From a weird dream about a weird spear.

These weird dreams come to us in the dark of night. Or in broad daylight, while idly daydreaming. And from a vast store of knowledge unknown to us in our everyday dealings. Our subconscious bubbles up to us ideas, sometimes weird. And for that reason, we pay no attention to them.

Some people do pay attention to the weirdest of things. The great majority of us dismiss them as childish.

In a song made famous by Elvis Presley. He sang emphatically "I've gotta follow that dream wherever that dream may lead me". He was told to go back to truck driving, he wasn't cut out to be a singer. But fortunately, another man persisted with him.

Just as well this man paid attention to his weird dream. Because from that dream was born a revolution. His name was Elias Howe, the inventor of the sewing machine in 1846.