You Can Dream any Dream you want to
“Life is hard. You might get hurt. Your heart might get broken. You might lose your job. You’ve still gotta commit. Don’t hesitate. Go. Commit… You can’t experience the Joy that is intended for you in life if you don’t Go.” — Will Smith
September 25th, 2018 was a historic day. It was Will Smith’s 50th birthday and the day he conquered a fear I’m not even sure he knew he had until 6 months ago. He jumped out of a helicopter…attached to a bungee cord…over the freaking Grand Canyon.
The Backstory
Let me first give you a little bit of background here before we dive into what lessons I take away from this historic day.
About 6 months ago, the guys from the YouTube channel Yes Theory (and specifically Ammar) had a crazy idea. They wanted to challenge Will Smith to heli bungee. You might ask yourself, what the heck is heli bungee. Well Will asked himself the same question.
But asking himself that question got him interested, and when he figured it out, a sense of fear came over him. Heli bungee is exactly what you expect; bungee jumping out of a helicopter. I mean I would be afraid too, but if you know anything about Will Smith, he hates being afraid. And if you introduce him to a fear, he has to overcome it.
It was Ammar’s dream to make this happen, but I’m not sure Yes Theory realized they could actually turn that dream into reality. That didn’t matter, they were determined anyway. They put up a video announcing the challenge on YouTube and let it out into the world; and what happened next changed everything.
If you haven’t paid attention to Yes Theory’s audience, they are super engaged and the community took it on themselves to get Will’s attention. And they sure did, it took a bit of time but Will posted this video on his channel that changed Yes Theory forever. Challenge Accepted!
I can only imagine the wave of emotions that overcame them when they saw this video. But you can watch it here, and see the joy and happiness on Amar’s face in the thumbnail.
After Will accepted the challenge, it took a few months but finally they were able to meet him in Budapest. I could go on about the details, but it’s probably better if you just watch the video.
Heli Bungee jumping over the Grand Canyon!
The details were laid out and it was happening, on Will Smith’s 50th birthday, he would jump out of a helicopter because of a challenge dreamed up in Ammar’s bedroom in Venice, California.
I myself couldn’t wait for this to happen. It gives me inspiration to know that any dream that you can put into your mind, you can make happen with hard word and some thinking outside of the box.
They did it, they were able to get the attention of one of the biggest movie stars on the planet. But when I think back on this, what actually was the reason this particular challenge resonated with Will? I’m sure there are thousands of people everyday trying to get his attention.
I think the reason that Will accepted was a common bond both the guys from Yes Theory and Will share, the idea of seeking discomfort. The idea that putting yourself outside of your comfort zone and overcoming fear can change your life.
I know I’ve been doing everything I can in my own life to seek discomfort, and when I started doing that; life became a lot more fun.
I was so excited to see the videos when Will and Yes Theory posted them on their channels. It gives me so much happiness and joy to watch them overcome their own fears, and have an amazing time while they are doing it.
Nothing in life is perfect, but if we commit and we put ourselves outside of our comfort zone, anything is possible. Yes Theory and Will Smith proved that last week. We can all learn a lot from them.
And here is Will’s video.
So go out there and seek discomfort. Talk to that cute girl in line at Starbucks, ask for that promotion, quit your job and book a plane ticket. But really just go build your dream, whatever that dream is. They proved it is possible, we all just have to make sure we believe in ourselves to make it happen.
