When I was growing up, I had a few ideas about how my life would turn out. One recurring plan went like this: I would play basketball for the University of Michigan where I would meet and fall in love with the woman of my dreams. I would marry her after graduation once I had been drafted to play in the NBA. I would have an electric career playing along side some of the league’s finest, after which I would retire and run for president of the United States.

As I am sure you can guess, my life has not turned out like that at all. I did play college basketball for a couple of years, but not at Michigan or any Division I school. I never did get married, and my interest in running for office died quickly after I finished a distant 5th in the race for class president for my college freshman class. Reality has a way of bringing our visions down to earth, crashing at times.

While there are times that our visions need to come closer to our reality, there are other times when it is the loftiness of our visions that elevates our reality as well as the reality of everyone around us. Such visions of a better world, or even a better life have driven some of our greatest inventors, our most accomplished researchers, our most talented business minds, and our most inspiring public thinkers. Over the past month, as a nation we have celebrated the life of Dr. King; one whose vision of a better nation rang out with boldness and conviction. Dr. King’s vision, most celebrated in his “I Have a Dream” speech, challenged a nation where hatred and violence were the order of the day. King’s message against the Vietnam War delivered in Riverside Church invited people involved in the fight against a violent government here at home to see the impact of that same governments actions around the world. King’s march with sanitation workers and his leadership in the “Poor People’s March” helped make clear the message that justice cannot simply be about the removal of laws that restrict freedom. Justice, I believe King would argue, must include providing the means by which people can earn enough money to be able to live with dignity.

Whenever I look at King’s vision of our nation, I am filled with a mix of joy and sadness. I have joy as I think about how far we have come. For example I am humbled at how much easier it was for me to get a college education than it was for my father, who fought with white students everyday of his freshman year at LSU in New Orleans.  At the same time I am filled with sadness when I think about how far we have yet to go: how we have allowed representational politics take the place of opportunities for all; how we are fighting many of the same battles for living wages and voting rights that were fought in the 1960’s.  This is the burden of a great vision. Even when it causes reality to move closer to it, it is never quite satisfied until the movement is complete. Until then, there is a longing for completion, a restlessness that exists, a tension continually pulls on reality, often disrupting it in the process. Living life in that restless space, in that tension, is hard work and if you are only focused on the end result, it can be unsatisfying. This is why so many people abandon worthwhile visions and settle for the cheap imitation of a slightly better reality.

I can think of no clearer example of this than the attempt to make President Obama’s election the fulfillment of King’s vision. While the election truly was a landmark day in American history, a day I was not sure I would ever see in my lifetime, it falls well short of even the most conservative understanding of King’s vision. King did not live and die talking and preaching about the United States with a Black president. He lived and died talking and preaching about a nation that lived up to its promises for every citizen, regardless of race, color, or religion. King’s vision has yet to be reached by our reality. Shame on us if fatigue or disinterest allows us to settle for simply an election victory.

As 2012 continues to march forward, let us use this year to lift up the visions that we have abandoned or neglected. Even if they must be retooled or re-imagined, let us pledge to live passionately even restlessly as we pursue vision rather than living under the self-delusion of false attainment.