Living A Dream

                                                                                                                                              Wilson 1

American Dream Essay

Jared Wilson  

Professor Kelly Warren

ENC 1102

February 26, 2013

                                                                Living A Dream

Everyone has heard the phrase ‘Living the American Dream’ but what does that really mean? To me, that always meant joining the Army Infantry and serving my county. In class we attended a lecture conducted by Mauricio Garcia; Mauricio told us his life story and what it took for him to live the ‘American Dream’. As kids we often dream about what life we want to live and who we want to be when we grow up, but as a kid you don’t know the challenges it takes for one to actually follow a dream and become that person they want to be. More often or not the American Dream becomes just that, a dream. Often it requires you to leave your comfort zone and take a path you feel completely lost on and that is something that is very hard to do, it’s almost as if we are wired to avoid this path and take the easy way out.

November 14, 2006 I took my first step to living my American dream; I left for Army Infantry basic training. Growing up I always wanted to be a soldier, every time I watched a movie about war, I always knew that was my calling. I had to join the army without telling my family or

Wilson 2

friends as every time I talked to them about it I always got a lecture about how that isn’t the life I  

wanted and it isn’t like the movies. “War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest,

easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is

the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.”(qtd in MAMA’s) When I told my family I joined the army they were upset but also proud in the same

sense, proud of me for stepping out of my comfort zone and leaving everything I knew behind to

follow a dream. It wasn’t until my first day of basic training that I started to realize what it was

going to take in order for me to stay on this path. It was that point in my life that I understood

 why more often or not the American dream is something that most people will never achieve.

            After graduating from basic training I was stationed at FT. Lewis, Washington, until that point I lived in Orange Park, Florida my entire life. Although one step closer to living my dream I was going to have to live this dream without my friends and family and that never crossed my mind. “Any time we open ourselves up to vulnerability, it’s a very uncomfortable mirror,”. (qtd by MS. Brown) While at FT. Lewis I like everyone else was lost, I had to completely start over I didn’t know anyone, I didn’t know where anything was. The weather there was cold and raining all of the time it was just a complete shock to me and I started to second guess myself on if this was really what I wanted in life. Like everything thing after a few weeks I was comfortable with where I was and what I was doing but I still wasn’t sure that was the American dream.

            However two months after arriving at FT. Lewis my unit deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. It was the middle of the night and I was on a helicopter flying to our base in the middle of Baghdad when we started taking fire from the ground. Once again I thought this isn’t the America dream I thought it would be, I was a 19 year old kid riding in a helicopter that was currently getting shot. It wasn’t until my boots hit the sand at my base that I realized this

Wilson 3

is the dream I wanted. Although I wasn’t sure up to this point I never gave up and it just clicked. I spent fifteen months over there and never once had a change of heart on my dream.

            In addition to my first deployment I was deployed again and spent another 12 months in Iraq. After my second deployment I decided that it was time for me to hang up my boots and come back home to Florida where I could continue to live the American dream. Only now I had a family so my idea of a perfect life was spending time with them and being home at night to sleep in my bed. My life to that point had taken me to parts of the world and seen things I could have never been involved in. I was very happy that I followed my dream and was able to do the things I always wanted. Achieving the American Dream remains very important to those who have yet to achieve it, especially the younger generations. However, the study reveals that Americans no longer place importance on traditional elements of the Dream: 70% say you don’t have to be wealthy to achieve the Dream; 65% say you don’t need a college degree; 71% and 70%, respectively, say marriage and children aren’t essential; 59% percent say you don’t have to own a home.(‘DO-IT-YOURSELF)

            Everyone is capable of living the American dream the only question is how bad do they want it. I was able to live my American dream because I didn’t give up, it wasn’t the easy road but it was the road I wanted. The biggest problem I see with people is the ability to step out of the comfort zone they have barricaded themselves in. This is a major obstacle for us as people to overcome and it takes a lot of work but the reward can be great. The reward of doing this just might be LIVING THE AMERICAN DREAM.

Wilson 4

                                                         Work Cited

Mamas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Soldiers

 Article by Cindy Sheehan CO founder of Gold Star Families for Peace

July 13, 2006

http://www.lewrockwell.com/sheehan/sheehan39.html

Tiptoeing Out of One’s Comfort Zone

New York Times by Alina Tugend Author for NY Times

Feb 11, 2011

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/12/your-money/12shortcuts.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

THE AMERICAN DREAM IS NOW DO-IT-YOURSELF

Fifth Annual MetLife Study

https://www.metlife.com/about/press-room/index.html?compID=72458