Late Dream: Finding Purpose

By B. Louis Richardson

Twenty years ago, author B. Louis Richardsons life radiated with purpose and direction; he had a simple life and harbored big dreams of becoming a pilot. But his life veered off on another path, and he worked successfully for many years in the retail industry. Recently, Richardson realized he had many unaccomplished dreams and discovered he was not dedicating himself to the plans God has for his life.

In this memoir, Richardson narrates his twenty-year journey of discovery and his goal of finding his lifes true purposethe one for which he was created. He tells of his life as a born-again Christian, his dedication to his family, his foray into the entrepreneurial business world, and his quest for self-fulfillment.

Through Richardsons journey, Late Dream communicates the positive effects of completely surrendering to the will of God. He bridges the gap between where we roam today and where a true knowledge of God will propel us to stand tomorrow.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Sep 26, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462000937

B. Louis Richardson

B. Louis Richardson is a born-again Christian who worked in the retail industry for fifteen years before reevaluating his lifes purpose. He and his wife have two children and live in Anguilla, British West Indies. Visit him online at www.latedream.com.

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Copyright © 2011 by B. Louis Richardson.

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ISBN: 978-1-4620-0091-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-0092-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-0093-7 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011913041

iUniverse rev. date: 10/07/2013

Contents

Acknowledgements

Introduction

1 Late Dream

2 A Wake-Up Call

3 Seeking Direction

4 The Playroom

5 Acquiring the Taste

6 Destiny’s Call

7 Purpose

8 The Start of a New Day

9 To the Next Level

10 Opportunity

Afterword

Acknowledgements

Thanks to my family and friends who encouraged and expressed confidence in me, helping me to continue. Thanks also even to a few strangers who motivated and challenged me.

To my wife, Violet Richardson, thanks for channelling my writing. She alerted me to the necessity of sticking to the subject.

Thanks to God for answering my prayer for the patience to complete this book. This is undoubtedly one of the most serious projects I’ve ever attempted. I have given it more than three years of my attention.

Introduction

Maybe your life isn’t quite fulfilling in terms of the job or career you’ve drifted into. Nevertheless, you struggle within yourself to continue, hoping to secure your future. Perhaps it’s time to let that dead-end job go and reach for fulfilment.

Following the plans God has for your life is both rewarding and fulfilling. God has a dream in His heart for your life, and this dream is your mega-purpose. God’s dream for us is our opportunity to go beyond our dreams. Contrary to what some religious people would have us believe, downloading His plans in our hearts is quite simple.

If you feel you have too many unaccomplished dreams or abandoned projects, I can completely relate. Accompany me down a twenty-year path, and you’ll realize your situation isn’t an isolated case.

Does this path contain a spectacular message? I hardly believe it. On the contrary, this exploration of my journey is quite simple—it is a true reflection of my simple lifestyle as it was twenty years ago, before I traded that simplicity for life’s complexities.

During the last few years, with fragmented hopes of aspiring to fulfil my purpose, I have written this book. I started with the idea of encouraging you to return to and follow your dream. But there is no dream as important as fulfilling the purpose for which we were created. The best thing any of us can do is to completely surrender to the will of God.

If you also feel out of touch with purpose, I offer an honest hand of friendship. Accompany me through a painful experience. Hindsight makes it also a regrettable voyage.

For however many years you stood in the wrong places or roamed in the wilderness, I can surely relate. But my aim is to bridge the gap between where we roam today and where a true knowledge of God will propel us to stand tomorrow.

1

Late Dream

Leaving my wife curled up on the bed, I walked across the hall and, in the chill of the night, started my routine by checking the kids. Even in the tropics, the air has a significant chill during February.

My wife appreciated that I considered it my duty to ensure that the kids were safe. Two or three times, I’d visit their room. These checks seemed to also develop a special bond between my wife and me, so it was a mutually beneficial journey down the hallway, gently illuminated by the light from the distant kitchen.

Our adventurous son, two years old, and energetic six-year-old daughter were both sleeping like tiny angels who had landed on a bed in our home, perhaps left here for a specific purpose. Occasionally the sound of the ocean trailed behind me as I left our room, but usually the only significant sound was the wind seeking to stream through the windows in the kids’ room also.

For several months, many thoughts had hinged on my mind as I’d crossed the doorways. The quietness of the night reduced the conscious influences that normally preoccupied me. I had grown to like my busy lifestyle. Usually, once my feet hit the floor in the morning, my mind raced, leading the way to my active daily schedule at the shoe store.

Often when I exited the kids’ room, I left thinking about their future. My wish was that they’d maximize their potential and become all they could be, taking advantage of every opportunity available to them.

Sometimes the squeak of a toy or a soft absorbing teddy bear under my feet interrupted my thoughts momentarily. But returning to the poorly-lit hallway, I’d resume my considerations, thinking about how I could brighten my son’s and daughter’s future pathways.

I wanted to cultivate my kids’ dreams from an early age. I dreaded seeing them lose focus like I had constantly during the last twenty years.

Two decades earlier, my life had radiated with purpose and direction, as I moved towards the completion of my own goals. I had returned from New York in 1990, having completed my private pilot’s course.

I’d grown up on the island of Anguilla—thirty-five square miles with a population of twelve thousand—in a society that was influenced by the American culture through television. Subsequently, I’d fitted right into Brooklyn.

Living in New York had truly afforded me some of the most exciting times of my life and, I’d thought, the most challenging. But the biggest challenges of my life would be at home in my own town during the years that followed.

I had huge dreams of becoming a professional pilot. At twenty-one, I made excellent progress. But an entrepreneurial spirit that had developed over several years stood in the door, beckoning me to follow a different path.

I really can’t put a finger on what it was exactly, but something in me generated an ambitious desire that went into overdrive. Instead of approaching the bank for a loan to continue my training as a pilot, I brought my newest retail business idea to fruition. That’s when I drifted off the aviation pathway into a retail business.

Over the next five years, I would fight with the market, running a mail-order business and implementing several retail ideas. I was trying to combine a pilot’s career with that of a businessman’s.

Later, I would find my place in the market, retailing men’s footwear. I would spend fifteen years of my life with a few shoe outlets. The eighth to the thirteenth years were extremely successful for the shoe company.

I always believed that my relentless, spirited approach in business would inevitably result in my becoming a professional pilot sooner rather than later. But toying with marketing products would keep me from my dreams much longer than I had anticipated.

A few years ago, some fifteen years after my New York experience, I did manage to return to aviation, but the return was short-lived. Within six months, I sold my aircraft and returned my attention to the shoe stores.

I had the market—the same market that had fought against me terribly in earlier years—by its tail. Evidently, with my experience guiding me, I could do nothing wrong. I was determined to explore every avenue possible in the shoe business.

In 2008, a year after my last cockpit experience, after I’d sold the aircraft, I realized that I didn’t belong in the four walls of a store any longer. I’d had enough of the career I’d drifted into. I decided to seriously pursue my lifelong dream of becoming a commercial pilot.

Shortly after that decision, my family