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Focus only on your own growth.
GapYear is a time for growth and happiness.
Back to ListBack to ListActually, I'm quite timid.
I liked thinking new thoughts I hadn't had before, but
I wasn't the kind of person who acted on them and lived adventurously.
It was only a few years ago that I first flew on a plane,
I go to a familiar restaurant and eat,
in places I find stable and comfortable
I prefer staying in them.
Even when we came to Australia, when my wife said let's go to Brisbane,
I said it sounded really dangerous and suggested we go to Sydney instead.
Even now, when we're discussing the itinerary for a world trip,
I don't want Central America because it's dangerous,
I don't want the Middle East either because it's dangerous,
Europe has a lot of pickpockets,
If you go to the U.S., you have to have a gun,
Africa is scary because of Ebola, haha.
At this rate, the countries I can go to are
It seems like there's nowhere to go except Korea.
Whenever I fly, I always
check the life vests at our seats myself
and mentally simulate the emergency exit procedures several times.
In conclusion,
the dangerous things I worried about didn't actually happen,
and the world outside the well was full of things I was seeing and accepting for the first time
It was a new world.
The world is vast, and my horizons in Korea were so narrow
I think it was a time when I could feel that.
For me, coming to Australia, finding work, meeting people, and traveling
this itself is stepping outside the well and a challenge.
So, unlike me, perhaps what I truly wanted
I am grateful for and happy with who I am now.
If my wife hadn't started the Dream Project.
I would probably still be living in my own little world.
January 27, 10:39 AM
Excerpt from Taeyang Park's Facebook post
Q.Were there any differences between planning the project in Korea and actually carrying it out in Australia?
Many aspects had to change.
First, before starting the Dream Project, we had to fully become working holiday participants. Because we had already experienced working life in Korea, we may have underestimated the working holiday. Two months after arriving in Australia, we even faced a crisis when our bank balance dropped to 120,000 won. This was because we hadn't sufficiently considered the cost of living in Australia when planning the project in Korea.
So first, we had to become working holiday participantsworkand start working, and after that we were able to gradually build the project. We are grateful that things didn't go according to our plans in Korea. Before departing Korea, we had an opportunity to receive sponsorship from a company. While receiving support and traveling comfortably to meet more people would have been nice, we felt that unless we experienced the working holiday ourselves, it would be hard to empathize with them, and we also felt that the company's requirements would dilute the project's meaning. We politely expressed our opinion, and ultimately the sponsorship contract fell through.
So we cried and struggled while balancing work and daily life, and thanks to that it became much easier to open up and have conversations when meeting friends for the Dream Project. However, juggling these three things—work, life, and the project—and dealing with the pressure of using English when working with foreigners meant that none of it was easy. Even so, we are deeply grateful that, step by step, time passed and brought us to the present.
Q. What has been the most difficult part of running the project?
I think relationships with people are the most difficult. Our project centers on the theme of dreams, helping people discover the talents and calling given within them, and as a result...the "muscle of the heart"We aim to cultivate it. So we travel to reach out first to those who need us.
However The more people we meet, the more sometimes, contrary to our intentions, we can't meet due to time or space limits, or someone tries to use us to satisfy personal selfishness, or people are more interested in the method than the meaning of the dream project and only want to get information — situations like these have upset us. Our hearts should be fertile so we can reach out to others, but there were times when we became so down that we felt we shouldn't meet friends in that state, and that was the hardest.
Also, since our project aims to provide opportunities for each person to think for themselves, many people leaned on us and asked even minor decisions like "Should I do this?" or "Should I do that?" It was difficult when we felt, "This isn't what we intended."
Q. On the other hand, what has been the most rewarding or the best part?
Of course, it's when we receive sweet feedback. Sometimes we hear confessions that their lives have changed because of the dream project, and sometimes we get feedback that it's even harder after deciding on a dream. We can celebrate joyful confessions, and difficult ones allow us to share and continue conversations to overcome them, so we like that too (of course, we'd prefer our friends to have more joyful moments than difficult ones).
We can't communicate frequently with all friends, but with some we maintain regular weekly communication. We share the good and difficult things we experience during the journey. It's not that we are providing unilaterally...a relationship where we listen to each other's stories and support one anotherThat's what it becomes. The fact that the dream project is not one-off but involves continuous relationships and that we share each step together gives us great satisfaction.
Q.During the Dream Project, was there a friend who left a lasting impression?
Of course. A friend in Daejeon had been communicating with us through social media, and we met in person for the first time during the Dream Project's nationwide tour. Although they stayed at a friend's house themselves, they offered their own apartment to us—an apologetic but warm gesture that moved us.This friend, who graduated from dental prosthetics, was very interested in design and marketing and was working in dental marketing. They wanted to show us where they worked, so they took us on a tour of the dental clinic after hours when it had closed, and there they held Dream Project consultations and offered encouragement.
When developing products or doing marketing, people usually consider design elements, but during our conversations we discovered they wanted to become a brand strategist centered on design.a new form of dream that doesn't yet existWe encountered that idea. In simple terms, it seemed they wanted design elements and colors to be so recognizable that, like the design features people associate with 'Apple,' those elements would be perceived as the brand identity.
We were unfamiliar with it too, but we listened to our friend's dream and continued encouraging them not to give up. Then, after a while, something amazing actually happened. With online support for this friend's dream and their continued effort, the marketing department of a late-night delivery app company...was scoutedand hired them. The company’s CEO was a designer, so the company valued design elements and, as part of its corporate social responsibility, created and distributed free fonts. I remember receiving the joyful news and celebrating together.
Q.How long have you been running the Dream Project in Australia? During that time, have your initial goals or thoughts changed?
"Our plans have changed a lot."
It's been eight months since I came to Australia for the Dream Project. Sometimes I wondered if it had already been eight months, and when I think about it there have been so many things. At first I didn't set any concrete goals because I wanted this project not to become a source of work-related stress. I only had the direction 'to travel to various Australian cities and connect with many people' was the only direction.
The plan was to stay four months each in Brisbane, Melbourne, and Sydney, using each city as a base to build networks, but as we adapted to life in Australia that plan changed a lot. We've been staying only in Brisbane for eight months. That doesn't mean the original plan fell apart. During the last month of our working holiday, we decided to visit Melbourne and Sydney solely for the Dream Project. We think of staying in Brisbane as conserving energy for that time.
"I was afraid that our pride would shrink and disappear"
We have strong pride in the Dream Project, holding the sense of mission that it is something society needs and that we are doing work that someone must do. Even we felt that when we staggered under the weight of reality, we were afraid that our pride would shrink and disappear. Going through this, the idea that our friends' futures...would be rainbow-coloredchanged.
If life is seen not as success but as maturity, I felt that we mature as much as we laugh but also as much as we suffer. If you set a dream that points the direction of your life and move forward, difficulties will surely arise. So I thought it would be more important to create relationships and networks that can be sustained and shared even after the Dream Project. We will meet more diverse dreams and people and become people who pass what we have on to others.
Q.I'm curious about your plans going forward.
"For now, we've only planned up to the Dream Project world tour."
Of course, because, as with everything so far, there's a high chance things won't go exactly as planned, we keep an attitude of being ready to revise it at any time. We'll wrap up in Brisbane by the end of April and plan to continue the Dream Project in Melbourne, Sydney, New Zealand, and other places until mid-June. After that, we'll return to Korea briefly to regroup for a month or two and then set off again for the world tour.
We only have plans up to here, and I don't know what comes after. No matter how much people predict and analyze, you can never know what will happen tomorrow. Tomorrow is uncertain, but we can do something about today. So we decided to focus on todayand focus on it. If we keep doing that, plans will continue to follow one after another and be carried along with life.
Q.What does 'youth' mean to the two of you?
Literally, "a verdant spring" is what I think.Not as a season of age but from the perspective of a state of mind. Even if my current feelings are a hot summer, an autumn with falling leaves, or a cold, frozen winter, I believe youth is the effort to preserve a springlike heart, since spring will eventually return. Also, spring is the season of hope and dreams. If you keep dreams in your heart and have the desire to add hope and effort toward those dreams, I think spring exists in anyone's heart. And it's even better if it's a vibrant spring. I think that's what youth is.
Q.I think the time you are spending now is also a gap year in your lives. What does a gap year mean to you?
To us, a gap year is a connecting link between periods of time.
Our dream project didn't come about overnight; it was formed through the life situations and experiences we've had and condensed into the name 'dream project.' A gap year is a link of time that connects the past, present, and future of our dreams, andI think it's like a converter that turns dreams into real-world words.I believe that a two-year world trip as part of our dream project will be a precious time that guides our lives from now on.
AustraliaDream ProjectD+160Commemorative Video