what's stopping you from doing what you want?

you owe yourself a life well lived

A few years ago, the very simple notion that I am the only person living my own life hadn’t really crossed my mind. There were strong external forces at play, and I tried my best not to disturb them. Made-up fears, other people’s preferences, other people’s vague opinions of how my life should be lived. And if there is one thing that feels as old as time, it’s this. It’s that we will find excuses to not do what we want to do. This pattern comes up again and again in my life, in my friends’ lives; I see it around me constantly and have a little existential crisis until I come back to the same conclusion: You can just go after what you want. And it’s not only that you can, it’s that you have to.

Earlier this year I realized I was craving a reinvention. I felt a strong pull towards shifting gears in my career towards following my creative passions more purposely. I always thought that if it is creative, I should just keep it as a hobby. But… why? I have enough people around me and enough experience of my own by now to know that it is not the case. I just never allowed myself the possibility of believing that. If people around me are succeeding in what I want to do, and if I feel a strong internal pull towards it, that’s all the convincing I need. But most people don’t assign any value to this internal pull. Which is funny, because it’s one of the most accurate and important tools we have for navigating life.

I don’t have many life philosophies that I consider set in stone, but there are a couple. And one of them is this: You owe yourself a life well lived. It’s what my dad told me when I was on the verge of making a really difficult decision. He knew he couldn’t tell me what to do (because in many of these decisions, the main person you should listen to is yourself), but he could tell me what I needed to remind myself. And it worked - it shook me and stayed with me, and guided me through this decision and many others. I find that when I’m operating based on this reminder, I don’t neglect myself. I become more conscious of the external influences on my decisions, and remember to listen to what I actually want to do… and that I owe it to myself to follow it.

I’ve learned two things that matter:

Firstly - if your instinct wants you to follow a direction, if you feel physically drawn towards pursuing something, then allow yourself to do that. It’s a literal sign in shining lights showing you where you would feel most fulfilled. No one else can point you towards that but you. Ignoring it makes it one of those things you will look back at in decades and think “I wish I had spent more time on XYZ”.

And secondly - most of the excuses you will come up with to not pursue it are not as valid as they feel. Everything has difficulties and compromises, but you get to choose why you’re facing them in the first place.

So I’ve been going ahead with blind faith and a little of my usual delusion that tells me that everything will work out in ways I can’t yet imagine - because I believe that is what happens when you pursue what genuinely lights you up, and you put in the work with no excuses, because you know you owe it to yourself to at least try. I’ve taken many steps towards prioritizing my passions more, made plans, and worked on them regularly instead of letting them remain ideas forever. Also, you are allowed to reinvent yourself and get more out of life. If you have many passions, you can live a life exploring many different directions, and it will be so much more rewarding than being the one keeping yourself in a box.

If you need a little sign, I’ve got one. One of my biggest passions is photography, but I love film, so recently I’ve been playing around with videography and color grading - so I decided to post one (very quick, very unplanned) attempt at it here. And what I couldn’t have imagined when posting it was that it was about to get over 12,000 likes and over 242 hours of watch time, which doesn’t happen to me every day, or ever. And for pretty much any fear or doubt I had in my mind, there was a comment under that video or a message telling me the opposite. It was a solid sign that if I can enjoy creating something so much and it resonates with so many people, I can rely on my creativity and trust myself and my ideas and unique perspective fully.

It is a reminder that very often, the only person stopping you from doing what you want is you. And I don’t want to be that person for myself. This also goes back to how real confidence is built: a huge part is actually realizing how important it is that you build trust with yourself, which can only be done when you learn how to prioritize your needs, your dreams, and passions.

This applies to creativity, careers, love, and all things in between, to all the decisions that shape your life.

When you actually stop and ask “what’s stopping me?”, and realize that it’s fear, or not taking your own dreams seriously, then it’s a little wakeup call that maybe you owe it to yourself to at least try.

---