Tell ‘Em About the Dream

“ … so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.”   Martin Luther King, Jr.

Over the past 2+ weeks, I’ve had multiple people share various iterations of the following: “This can’t be 2021!  The new year was supposed to be different.  So far it’s been more of 2020, only worse!”  If that is a sentiment you share, for you I declare today December 50th, 2020. 

Indeed, from the PPE we wear each day to vaccine distribution confusion to the mind-boggling daily news, the times we live in are certainly surreal.   How might our present challenges provide the impetus for us to together envision and create a different and better future?   

Martin Luther King, Jr. had some thoughts about that and articulated them in a speech that continues to reverberate almost 58 years later.   It is commonly called his “I Have a Dream” speech.  If you’ve never watched it, here is your opportunity.  MLK I Have a Dream .  The most well-known part of the speech was not part of his notes.  Soon after the Gospel singer Mahalia Jackson implored Dr. King to “Tell ’em about the ‘Dream,’ Martin,” he moved away from his prepared text and “told ‘em” (12:30 mark in the video).  And the rest, as they say, is history – part of our collective history. 

We also each have (or at least had) a dream.  When we started our professional journey, it was a dream of service to others, articulated in various ways in our professional school application essays.  For many, the idealism of that early dream has faded, perhaps long ago, or perhaps as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic.   Right now, the need for the manifestation of that dream has never been greater.   

So as we recognize the legacy of Martin Luther King on the federal holiday in his name, consider taking pause to reconnect with and perhaps recommit to his dream, and your own.  There will be new challenges and difficulties when our present one’s pass, and therefore there will always be the need for those who dream of a better collective future – and then take action based on that dream. Or as Martin would perhaps say, “Dream … Invite ‘em … Do … and repeat for as long as it takes.”