DR. WALLACE: My aunt is very upset with me! I'm a 16-year-old girl who has a little piglet for a pet! This aunt is my mother's sister and she says that it is disgusting and illegal to have a piglet for a pet. She even yelled at my mother over this.

Does this mean I have to give my pet piglet to the police now? Do I take her to the police station since I can't exactly take her to the dog pound in our city? If my aunt is not correct, then I'd like to keep my little pet since she's fun and I can tell that she likes me. — I Have a Pet Piglet, via email

I HAVE A PET PIGLET: Your aunt might not agree with the idea of having a piglet for a pet, but it's highly doubtful that it's illegal in your area. To be sure, you can go online to research the rules on pets in your community.

If for any reason you do have to find a new home for your pet someday, I'd suggest that you start with the source from which you received her in the first place. Your letter did not mention when and where you got her, but wherever that was would be a good source for potentially finding her a new home if it comes to that.

In the meantime, it's quite likely that you enjoy your pet despite your aunt's reservations. Perhaps it would be better for your mother to visit her sister's home in the future rather than have her come to your domicile.

MY GOALS ARE TOO UNREALISTIC!

DR. WALLACE: I have hopes and dreams like everyone else seems to have, but my problem is that I always make my dreams too specific and too grandiose. I want to succeed wildly at the things I fantasize about and unfortunately, because my dreams are so overtly unrealistic, this makes me depressed after a few months go by, and I come to the realization that I've been fooling myself.

This pattern has repeated itself several times now. I'm up to four or five full cycles of hopeful expectation, followed by a crushing dose of reality.

Without getting into my specific goals and dreams, is there anything you could advise me to do so that I can break this cycle? — My Dreams Are Too High, via email

MY DREAMS ARE TOO HIGH: My advice is to not take your initial dreams all the way to their end point, given your past history of the counterproductive cycles that you've mentioned.

Instead, take out a piece of paper and write your overall dream at the top. Then take your focus away from the ultimate goal and instead write out a list of the steps you'll need to achieve in order to someday hopefully reach that end goal, or somewhere near it.

If your goal, for example, were to become a doctor, you'd need to get good enough grades to be accepted into medical school. Then you'd need to successfully attend that school and achieve good grades to keep getting you closer to your overall goal. If this were your goal, I'd also advise you to seek out a doctor who might consider mentoring you to give you a realistic idea of what it takes to become a doctor someday.

This "doctor" example is just an example to show you that there's many smaller, much more manageable steps that are required to achieve an overall goal. Take your current goal and see how you can best break it down into "action steps." Organize these steps into chronological order so that you can begin working on the first ones that are required.

And no matter what your goal may be, seek to network with other people, and perhaps find a mentor who can guide you through some of the initial steps. It will help you to build momentum and confidence as you go forward toward executing your overall plan.

Dr. Robert Wallace welcomes questions from readers. Although he is unable to reply to all of them individually, he will answer as many as possible in this column. Email him at [email protected]. To find out more about Dr. Robert Wallace and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

Photo credit: Christopher Carson at Unsplash