On “Dream Rut” by William Heidbreder
Troubled? Got problems with your life and career? To navigate them, start with your dream, with what you really and most want to do.
“Dr. Yumi,” the popular Columbia University prof specializing in Leadership Development, tells you how, in this short, delightful book. Which, with its pleasing illustrations and minimal style, may fit a niche in the otherwise enormous self-help literature market, given its deceptive simplicity and charm, delighting as it instructs. “Let your thoughts and feelings flood the pages,” the book begins, itself almost dreamily. For all the solid thinking behind it, it’s a self-help book that won’t keep you awake with worries.
In America, there is this notion of “the” dream as an ambition you have a right to want in a game you may not win. Dr. Yumi is, in a way that’s equally American, an optimist. The failures or disappointments to which we all are liable, are to her ruts, obstacles in navigating life and work as career (from a root that means forward movement in a vehicle). True to the self-help genre that merges pop psychology with business advice — this professor’s daytime domain — the right thinking gets moving again. That starts with what you really want, what you dream of. Your situation does not define you, your desire does, and who you are is given by what you want. Thus, life as a voyage one navigates: we don’t just move between jobs or relationships, we move ourselves through them. Maybe what’s keeping you fretfully awake is you’re not dreaming rightly. But of course you are; the noise is your dream caught in a rut, and that’s why you are, or your path is. You don’t need to decipher the dream, as in Freud, just know what it is, keep it mind, and cultivate the best relationship, since your dreams are about what you want, what you love.
For your dream is not some inner essence you are, but what you most want. The mature person’s success lies in having the right relationship with their dream or dreams. So your work life is maybe not so different fundamentally from the one you have with the people you love, but it’s also a self-relation. My own field being philosophy, I can’t help noticing that this is the relationship between the self as thinking and as being, where the latter is driven by what you want. And you may not know or recognize what that really is. Dreams are desires, so it’s not your self as lovably wonderful that matters so much as what you love, including what you love doing. Key is what this self aims at or desires; that’s why we can have a relationship to our dream. The book’s advice fits what philosopher Harry Frankfurt calls “the importance of what we care about.” This doctor’s maxim could be: know what you want; want what you love.
A tale of lost innocence? Yes, in part: what people really want is basically good, and it’s how most of us started out doing before hitting obstacles, interference, or uncertainty of direction—ruts. We adjust, make the best of things, but can lose the central threads that orient and drive us. Since you are what you want, ask yourself, what is that, really? Stay true to it, and a happy success may be yours. A secular salvation? Yes, but this professor’s poetic story, presented more as exemplary toolkit (take it or leave it) than prescriptive universality, is far from the business bromides of New Age preachers, who would keep you up all night worrying over your woes. Almost hiding its wisdom in its charm, this is, like Alice in Wonderland or The Little Prince, one of those wonderful, wise children’s books for adults. The text and images are crafted with such artfulness that declarations familiar from pop business ethics, like that “determination and perseverance” are “keys to success,” do not fall flat. In fact, they are taken for granted, in what’s not a wearisome sermon but a gentle guide.
She speaks of real problems, like job dissatisfaction, in a poetic style that is heartfelt and touching. The dreamy read doubles as a workbook (with questions like, “What possibilities do you see….?”) that you’ll return to, re-read, and stop and think about. The need to attend to the work of navigating, against rocks, countercurrents, and drift, is great in our world, where, especially in working life, alienation is common and authenticity elusive. There is something of the childlike here, but as a resource to draw from.
Analyzed are different kinds of “ruts”—failures you can fall into but also get out of, though many people stay in them, getting stuck: a dream could be, differently, estranged, unfulfilled, or unknown, and she will then analyze and give advice relevant for each. Further categories are suggested, like the dream being “untouchable, undiscoverable, and unappreciable.” There’s good advice here, too, often with a touch of that “spiritual wisdom” common in the field. “You may discover that the excitement actually lies in the smallest, slightest things,” or “you may realize that the unknown is part of any dream and decide to forge ahead anyway.” She’s distilled a lot of information, in some of the stanzas of the poetic meta-tale in this candy-wrapped book.
Finally, this deceptively light lullaby of a read announces next-to-last that, having earned it, you can now go to sleep: “Your dream becomes a lifelong companion that you can close the day with. Like that comfy blanket or a snug pillow that lulls you to sleep every night.” When you awake the next day, you may consider that you danced with an oracle, and, in the conversation, realized some things, and that these are insights you can now put to work.
Kirkus Reviews
An uplifting and visually stunning motivation for readers to follow their dreams.
Shimabukuro offers a brief illustrated parable about finding the path to your dreams in this motivational guide.
The author opens her nonfiction debut (beautifully illustrated by Deng) with the story of a little girl “scattering sprinkles” on the cupcakes she’s just made and deciding that she wants to open the world’s best bakery. She embarks on the path to reach this goal, naturally encountering obstacles along the way. This gives Shimabukuro the narrative framework to clarify such journeys for her readers, regardless of the dream they’re chasing. As those readers are drawn through the story by the book’s lovely full-color illustrations, the author offers advice: “Actively engage and listen to your dream so that you can communicate better and learn,” reads one such passage.” Shimabukuro also offers her readers gentle, prompting questions, like “What possibilities do you see between where you are and the horizon?” These are helpful for establishing reflective landmarks throughout the brief story. The narrative is never a pre-ordained triumph—the girl is often unsure of herself: “Her abundance of abilities and passion had failed to ignite a breakthrough,” readers learn after one setback. “Like a shooting star, she could feel herself burning bright before disappearing.” This narrative approach serves to highlight both the author’s winning empathy and her pragmatic view of working toward a goal. In careful, well-informed prose, she counsels readers about ways to reach their goals and to deal with the parameters of those goals changing over time. The soft-spoken wisdom and unflagging encouragement in these pages make this a good option for readers dealing with frustration, or for students just starting out in life and wondering whether they’ve got the courage to pursue their ambitions.