Dreaming Has a Low ROI

Last week I was riding the Long Island Rail Road on the way to a meeting and I noticed a great ad for CareerBuilder.com. It said “Dreaming has a low ROI” (Return On Investment) . I thought this was genius since that is what most people do. Dreaming is great and is exceptionally easy to do but in the end it doesn’t get you anywhere. You may have a nice warm feeling inside for a few minutes but that is about all you can squeeze out of a dream.

To get the return on your investment from dreaming, you need to put your dream into action and go for it. In the case of CareerBuilder.com, they are telling you that you can dream all you want about a better job, salary, boss, location, but without taking the first step, which is creating a CareerBuilder.com account and uploading your resume, you will never realize any of your dreams.

This can go for anything in life. If you are dreaming of something better, whether it is starting a business, retiring young or even taking that dream vacation, you must create a plan and put it to work. To start a business, you can start by writing a business plan and figuring out if your business is feasible and if it will be profitable. Then you can start following your new blueprint. The better the plan, the easier it will be to get going.

To retire young, start figuring out what you need to retire such as how much money you will need to live off of and for approximately how many years. Then figure out how you can get to that point. Once again, you can create a plan which may include getting debt free, saving money and investing.

The same goes for that dream vacation or anything else your heart desires. Make a plan of how you are going to realize your goal and jump on it. If you don’t, your life is but a dream.