my dream is to live in like a 1.5br/1.5ba house (preferably with some sort of solar/screened porch) in the middle of a wooded area with frequent rainfall - but still relatively close to like a decently sized city/town - and do so comfortably with some sort of third-shift/wfh job that isn’t too demanding.

this is unobtainable in Amerikkka, may it die soon, for like at least three different reasons so one can only pray life is indeed shorter rather than longer.

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Short answer: No, because people in in industrialized societies aren’t taught how to dream properly.

Loooooong answer: Anybody here read The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho? If you haven’t, don’t. It’s bad. But it was hugely popular in the early aughts when The Secret was also kicking around and it has a similar vibe. A boy dreams of gold buried near the pyramids and a fortune-teller says it’s real and he should go looking for it. He sets out and along the way meets people who have Given Up and settle for mediocrity, and he turns their lives around with The Power of Entrepreneurship because anything is possible when you are chasing your dream.

He meets the titular alchemist, who gives him some gold for his journey and reaches the pyramids at long last. But he finds no treasure and gets beaten up by thieves who also steal his alchemist gold. Defeated, he goes home and meets someone who listens to his story, scoffs, and says that dreams are stupid; he keeps dreaming of treasure buried in the protagonist’s back yard, would you believe it? Our hero goes home and finds the treasure right where the man said it would be.

The explicit moral of the story is that you’re never supposed to give up even when chasing your dream and that if you are sincere in your pursuit and dogged enough things will find a way and the universe will manifest a bounty for you.

The implicit moral is that we’re all just being jerked sround for the amusement of the demiurge who rewards and punishes us arbitrarily.

The actual moral is that it’s always someone else’s dream. The protagonist’s dream didn’t come true, some random dude’s did; he just stole it. And what was there? Wealth, big whoop. Yeah, it’s actually a metaphor for whatever you desire most in the world, but, and let’s be real with ourselves here, for the majority of Oprah’s book club that desire is wealth.

The fact is that people are bad at predicting what will make them happy, both because things are always better in our imaginations and second because the hedonic treadmill is baked into our brains and always makes what we don’t have feel superior to what we do. And capitalism swoops in and hijacks all that machinery so spectacularly well that the world’s wealthiest countries are also it’s most miserable (also some if its happiest, paradoxically, but I’d argue Nordic social democracies do well at meeting the basic material needs of their citizens, at least).

The way off the hedonic treadmill is to actively practice gratitude, but that’s predicated on having your basic material needs met (no one should be made to. Feel grateful for an empty stomach).

I feel like this is mostly preaching to the choir because folks here are empathetic and understand that, however appealing, the lifestyles of the wealthy are wasteful and unsustainable, but I think it’s worth pointing out that dreaming in the developed world is so ruthlessly constrained by society and culture that it’s no longer useful, if ever it was.

Can’t do shit without money

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I live my dreams within my means

Until the world is safe and fair enough for everyone to have the opportunity to even have dreams for the future, let alone live them, it feels wrong to me to put much more than subsistence-level effort into my own frivolous bullshit. Gotta have a little fun and fulfillment to keep going, sure, but making my own personal wishes a main goal just doesn’t feel right.

I guess maybe the world being safe and fair for everyone actually is my dream, but it’s not an achievable personal goal.

Edit - upon reflection, this feels like a Debbie-Downer kinda comment that didn’t engage with the heart of the question, and that’s not who I want to be. I’m sorry, OP.

My actual dream life would be living with my polycule and assorted friends and family in agricultural bliss. Ideally, I’d live in one of many houses on a large rural lot, with people who similarly treasure a balance between privacy and community as we cherish and care for each other, our plants and animals, and the land.

I’m on my way to a certain extent - I have a house on a couple acres, there’s certainly room here for more people - but I’ve put the social stuff on the back burner since we fell out with our friend group over COVID and other lifestyle and ethical differences. I’ve had trouble figuring out where I fit in with the local organizing scene, largely due to social/relational issues stemming from undiagnosed neurodivergence. I’m hopeful that medication and therapy will help me do better.

Sorry again, OP. Really don’t want to piss in your Cheerios.

Money

Wage labor is the big one

My aspirations 15+ years ago were boring. My REM dreams are all nonsensical and always have been.

Much of my life today is wilder than I could have guessed, although ADHD and some childhood baggage still holds me back sometimes.

I don’t want to be alive

My dream is to not have to work but still have the comforts of food and shelter and clothes that come from working.

The approved ways to achieve that goal are unobtainable for me and I already make more than my parents ever did

if I want things, I want to not have the avoidant personality thing. I want real life friends that feel like friends, not like people I keep around by pretending. And I want a social environment that gives me the external motivation to accomplish things despite having adhd. Even with meds it’s a struggle, without meds I’m cooked. Also, since we’re dreaming, I want to work both in the arts and sciences, and in the sciences at a level where I get to actual do the science and not just be support. I’m fucking good at music, just also really shy about it. And I’m okay at writing, except I kinda worry I have no voice as a writer because I have no sense of self, probably where the avoidant shit comes from lol. And I struggle to find anything I can write for more than a few pages before I get burned out and hate it. I’ll probably delete this because, like most things I say or do, I find it embarrassing lol.

i have developed a crippling addiction to corn syrup and paying rent, I don’t have time for “dreams”