The Shiny Far-Away Apple: reaching for a dream

Imagine your dream – perhaps a life goal or career hope – as a perfect apple on a tree branch.

Basket in hand, you stretch on tiptoes for that apple, fearing that it will rot before you can pick it… but the branch is way out of reach. Then you notice the deep-red apples on branches right beside you – ones that are already ripe, and which you can pick easily. So, you set to work collecting them, using them in pies, fruit salads, and as snacks to fuel the next day’s picking. Every day, you try reaching up towards that top branch, just in case it’s moved a little closer.

When you’ve finally collected the last few apples, you look at the remaining top one again… and realise that it’s only just ripe. Because the sunlight had made it glow bright red, you hadn’t known it wasn’t actually ready yet. Only now, as you hold out a hand, you watch it fall from the branch and land directly in your palm. You couldn’t have picked the glowing apple before its time, because the tree needed you to collect all the other apples first, so that it could give its best nutrients to the last one.

Focus on collecting and using the apples that are already ripe, and as you work, the others will ripen with you. When you’re ready to pick them, they’ll be ready too.

What is the dream at the top of your apple tree?🍎

A note:

There’s my little metaphor for how small steps lead to a larger goal! It popped into my head the other day, and I’ve since been reminding myself of it while writing my novel. As some of my lovely Instagram commenters mentioned: there may be many apples that we reach for, only to find that over time they’ve become the ones that are easy to pick. I suppose it’s all about perspective and that sort of thing 🙂

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