"Your Dreams Will Go Higher Than Expectation Could Be"

I got that in a fortune cookie once, and saved it. Despite the semi-broken English, It's always given me a little bit of encouragement whenever I rediscover it.
Truth is, I have a lot of dreams for myself. As counter-intuitive as it may sound, I sometimes find myself avoiding looking them in the face, since it sometimes feels like I'm so far away from achieving even one of them. I know that I'm young in the ways of the real world, and I probably have years to work towards goals that I've set for myself. The honest truth is, though, that my impatience and disappointment compound and work against me - to the point where I feel stupidly paralyzed by my own inactivity. All of that sounds like a bunch of nonsense and self-pity, which it sort of is. This is just where I am this Monday night, I guess.
However, this was not mean to be a post where I just bitch at the abyss of the internet. This is actually supposed to be motivating! So, tonight I wrote a list of the short-term, tangible goals (dreams, if you're feeling wistful). By tangible, I mean things that are actually possible, like "always be reading something for pleasure, even if it sometimes feels like work" as opposed to "marry someone for his intelligence and charm only to find out that he's the secret crown-prince of Monaco." You get the idea.
The first, and the one I'll share here, is to publish something, even in the most obscure, only-to-be-read-by-my-immediate-family, type of online journal, by the end of this year. This means several things. The first being, I have to write something. The second, logically, is that I have to finish whatever it is that I write. This may seem deceptively simple, but it can be quite the opposite - especially finishing the things that I start. I've been starting different stories at a pretty good clip lately, so the trick will be making myself bring things to a swift and successful conclusion. So, I'm going to forge ahead. If I'm lucky, I may end up one little step closer to the things I want.