Everyone has oceans to fly, if they have the heart to do it.
Is it reckless? Maybe. But what do dreams know of boundaries?
– Amelia Earhart

I just watched Hilary Swank’s stunning performance as this brave and forever boundary-pushing flier in the movie “Amelia”.
And it struck me that Hilary herself is a stellar example of a person whose dreams and active imagination gave her oceans to fly, on a journey that is still unfolding.

Hilary Swank grew up in a trailer park near Bellingham, WA, an only child with a single mom and a missing dad. She dropped out of high school. Then she dreamed of making it big in Hollywood. Her mom took this “impossible” dream so seriously that she drove them to California, where they lived in the car.

Hilary’s dream came true. Her first big role was in “Boys Don’t Cry”. She was paid only $3,000, but she won an Academy Award. Her next movie was “Million Dollar Baby” and since then no one has been paying her bottom dollar.

Hilary is a dreamer in many senses. She has described a recurring dream in which she saved someone’s life. After the third of these dreams, she felt deeply that she needed to “honor the dream”. She took a CPR course “just in case.” Three weeks later a man in an airport collapsed in front of her and she kept him alive using the CPR she had learned, until the paramedics arrived. The man died on the way to hospital, but she gave him a chance.

Hilary told the last dream story on “60 Minutes” on January 30, 2005.