Recently, I received word that a friend of mine was going through a

pretty rough time. His father passed away after a 10-year battle with

cancer. My friend, Dan, often talked to me about his dad, usually in

terms of pride and heroism.

Dan is very proud of his dad for several reasons. One he related to

me was that even though his dad had been a very successful

businessman, he still had time to be a dad. Dan said, “any male can

be a father, but it takes someone special to be a dad”.

I once asked Dan if he had any heroes in his life and he said without

hesitation, “my dad”. He went on to tell me how his dad had been one

of several patients to be given an experimental treatment for the type

of cancer he had, and that all of the patients had long since passed

away, but his dad was still fighting. Dan’s eyes glowed but watered a

bit as he shared his dad’s courage, strength, stamina, and desire for

life.

My friend travels a lot and is out of town several weeks out of the

year. He told me that he used to call his dad every night and see how

he and his mom were doing. Dan said that they would always end their

conversation the same way-“Good-bye, dad, I love you”. “Good-bye, son,

I need you, and remember, when you lose your dreams, you die.”

Allow me to give my personal impression of the meaning of the father’s

closing words. First, I do not believe he was saying anything about

nocturnal visions. Nor do I think he was commenting on physical death.

On the contrary, I believe what he was communicating to his son was:

when you have no ambition or goals in life, when there is nothing to

look forward to in the morning-you will experience a psychological

death. This experience can be so traumatic that resurrection from it

is almost as difficult as from the physical. I believe psychological

death is the leading cause of drug abuse, suicide, homelessness, teen

pregnancy, alcoholism and dropping out of school. I also believe it

has been the cause of failure for nations and empires throughout

history. In addition, it has been the cause of failure of many great

men and women. And, I believe Dan’s dad knew what it could do to his

children, and with his words and through the pattern of his life, he

would not allow this to happen to them.

He must have had tremendous insight on life to be able to effectively

communicate this message to his son. So well communicated in fact,

that his words have impacted literally thousands of people around the

world. It is possible he received this insight from a scripture in the

Bible that says, “Where there is no vision, the people perish”

(Proverbs 29:18).

Wise words and actions are what heroes are made of. If fathers

everywhere would take the time to share these important words with

their children, “When you lose your dreams, you die”, maybe we would

have fewer of the societal problems mentioned above. But mainly, I

know we would have more children in the world who looked up to and

respected their dads. After all, a hero is someone who is respected

and admired for something they have done.

To fathers everywhere, have the wisdom and courage to be a “dad”. A

dad is someone you can look up to no matter how tall you are. Be a

hero to your children. Give them words and actions in your life that

provide a role model to follow. Do something heroic-BE A DAD.

Dr. Tom Hollis is the Director of Graduate Studies in Education at

Southwest Baptist University.

– Dr. Tom Hollis