Life can be tough, but it’s worse when you don’t believe in yourself enough to pursue your dreams.
Despite what you might see on social media or in magazines, most people had to work bloody hard to get where they are.
It might take years of fight and slog and daily monotony before you can look up and realise, actually, you know what, I’m doing okay.
And sometimes, that first good thing that comes along can be the start of something bigger. Because it gives you the confidence to keep going, to keep submitting, keep applying, keep dreaming.
All the failures you had before will teach you about success. They’ll teach you about yourself and who you want to be. They’ll harden you to rejection, just enough that you won’t give up. And when the good things happen, you’ll embrace them, because you know you deserve this.
Look around at the people you admire, at their version of success.
It didn’t happen overnight.
They probably had days where it was all too much, where they were buried under endless work and not enough results, where the goal felt too far away and it all ate away at their insides until they wanted to stop and just be.
But they didn’t and you don’t have to either.
Life isn’t easy, especially if you dream big. But the rewards are greater if you believe in yourself and open up to the world and all the magical things in it.