1/ I had 3 dreams as I grew up.

a) Run the NYC Marathon
b) Write a book
c) Produce a play on Broadway

For a kid who used the G-3 bus to get to Regal chowk for high school and W-18 to get to campus on Bhains colony, these were all moon shots.

2/ I knew they weren't real and it would take more than an alignment of planets to get me to a stage where these would become more than wishful thinking.

But I continued to dream and added more to the list.

Might as well be a traveler of the world, in business class, no less.

3/ The NYC marathon was an evolved version of an earlier dream.

One that involved running track for the national team.

Once I figured that I was too old for that to happen, I accepted a simpler version. I would be happy running a marathon. NYC would do just fine.

4/ Interestingly enough a few years later I found myself living in NYC. The dream was within reach.

We went looking for shoes and ended up spending $100 on a pair of gel-soled cutting edge @Reebok that looked as if they had been designed by a pair of rocket scientist on Mars.

5/ It was a fortune for a student family living on borrowed finances. But for a good cause.

A shot at making something happen that I had dreamed of since my pre-teens years.

That day I went for my first run on campus. It was February we had just been hit by a blizzard.

6/ The indoor gym at @Columbia had an elevated track. It was the only option possible in that weather.

I had been an outdoor runner all my life. I hated it.

This wasn't what I had dreamed of. A few weeks later, the class schedule went ballistic and the shoes were put aside.

7/ @Columbia also had Miller Theater on campus, right on Broadway. Over the next year we try three times to put together a team that would produce one of my favorite plays "Harvey" by Mary Chase.

We make it through casting, reading and rehearsals but fail to see it through.

8/ By this time I had figured it out.

Every dream has a price. Whenever we are ready to pay it, dreams become real.

If we get distracted by life or work schedules, they don't.

I couldn't afford to chase dreams when I had debts to pay, a family to support and a child to raise.

9/ The Reebok's survived the next two years till the gel-pockets got punctured and leaked. But I still have our rehearsal copies of Harvey, somewhere in my storage boxes.

And I didn't even get started on the book in NYC.

10/ Fast forward 6 years.

We are back home in Karachi. Running and Broadway plays are a distant memory.

But I have a first draft of a book in my hands. It's been a work in progress for three years. Fueled by a failed venture, late nights and my course on startup failure.

11/ The book came out of nowhere.

A starved stray kitten on your doorstep nurtured by love and care into something you could never imagine on day one.

It goes up on Amazon as an e-book. Family gives the first thumbs up. @rizvee edits it, @jehan_ara reviews it

12/ In 2008, I finish teaching a class in Singapore and a student invites me to his office.

He runs the 3rd largest printing press in the region. I ask him what would it take to see my book in print.

He says send it over. And the print edition is born.

13/ Five more years go by.

I wake up one morning with a message from an editor from a 170 year hold publisher waiting for me in my mail box.

He had seen a bit of something I have written and wants to know if I would be interested in turning it into a book

14/ We sign a 2 book deal with @Palgrave

2 years later I am a published author of a pair of text books. No one actually reads them, but they sure look good on my profile.

Nothing like a pre-sales call that begins with handing over of a signed copy of your book to the board.

15/ 33 years to see one dream come to life.

All it takes is one to get you started on the others.

A year later I have put on my running shoes and I am beating my 13 year old daughter in the quarter mile.

It is deeply embarrassing for both of us. But its a start.

16/ The quarter mile turns into cross country; cross country becomes road running; road running leads to weekly 5ks.

At a 10k registration I realize every one I want to run with is running a half, so I register for the half.

I think I am crazy but I remember the old Reeboks

17/ Dreams wait patiently in the background for us to come back to them.

I didn't make it to the NYC Marathon, but I ran 3 half marathons in Karachi. They were more satisfying, even better.

I didn't get my play on Broadway but I am done with book # 5.

2 out of 3, works for me.

18/ Why the long lecture.

I lived in NYC but wrote my books and ran my half's in Karachi.

Focus on what you have and have been blessed with, rather than what you don't have and can't get.

NYC, LA and Leesburg were points in my journey but they weren't the final destination

19/ The dreams became real when I was ready to pay the price. In terms of time, commitment, effort and sacrifice.

There was also one final missing ingredient.

For the dreams to become real, I had to come home.

20/ Don't give up on dreams.

If you can't pay the price now, don't worry. They will wait.

Place them gently inside the windmills of your mind, like forgotten love letters.

Or an old pair of Reebok, or rehearsal copies of Harvey.

They will be ready whenever you are.

21/ And ignore the arrogant assholes, the idiots, the naysayers, the voices that tell you, you won't amount to much and this isn't real.

If you haven't written a book or run a half as yet, its not because you can't or you won't.

They will be ready, waiting, whenever you are.