If your childhood was anything like mine, wishing on 11:11 was a staple. The excitement was palpable when glancing at a clock and seeing the numbers 11:11 appear to your eye. I remember squeezing my eyes so tight (I am surprised I don't have any wrinkles) and wishing for anything and everything that appeared in my head:

In some manner or form, you can probably relate to your younger self, wishing for these things and more. I am sure the wishes were as varied as the stars in the sky. As I got older, the wishes started turning into "things" that at the time, I didn't quite realize were not wishes at all, but were things within my grasp.

This crystallized for me when I spent two years wishing on those damn numbers for a miracle. I looked for every opportunity to wish for my mother's cancer to disappear.

Can you guess what happened?

11:11 let me down. It never honored any of my wishes as a kid, and when it really counted...when it really mattered....it left my greatest wish unanswered and me motherless at nineteen.

We all need dreams. We all need hope. But there is something to be said about letting go of a silly made up a combination of numbers to take care of what is going to happen to us. Most everything, we have no control over. The one thing we do have control of? Our mind. Our attitude. Stop letting "things" - like 11:11 - decide how you are going to go about your day. Some things we cannot change - like the sickness of a loved one - but we can change our mindset and our actions.

Stop waiting for 11:11. Stop waiting for someone's approval. Just stop waiting. The more we wait, the more we waste our precious life. We don't have forever. There is no infinity awaiting us.

There is a fragile line between hoping and doing. We can spend our lives in a mist of dreams without any action, or we can start somewhere and take charge of what's lying ahead. If you don't reach, you'll never grasp. Stop wishing and waiting for the little things and start reaching for those things that matter to you.