Giving Yourself Permission

When I put together my vision board for 2023, I knew I wanted to include this page from Cleo Wade’s book Heart Talk. I’m not usually a huge poetry gal, but I pulled so many pieces of inspiration from this short and sweet and jam-packed book.

The passage reads:

You are the only person who truly decides who you you are. If you want to be a singer…think like a singer, say you are a singer, and of course sing your song. We spend so much of our lives waiting for others to qualify us. Authorize yourself. Step into your power right now; give yourself your own credentials , and you be the one who qualifies who you are. Why not? Nobody knows you better than you do.

This spoke to me on a cosmic level.

Ever since I can remember, I’ve had huge dreams. When I was a little girl, I fell in love with Shakespeare and theatre and dreamt of winning an Oscar one day. I pursued acting for over a decade and ultimately decided that the uncertainty and lack of control over your destiny wasn’t for me. Then in University I became obsessed with the idea of sharing beautiful things and inspiring people the way that Martha Stewart does. What both of these dreams have in common is the feedback I would receive when I told people.

Is that really a realistic goal? Are you really good at that? You know there are much skinnier and more beautiful women out there doing the same thing right? Do you have it in you? You know that it’s really unlikely that you’ll make it right?

Sometimes, even the people closest to me would push back in ways that sent me spiralling and questioning. Maybe they were right. Maybe it is too hard and maybe I’m not talented enough.

Something big shifted in me over the last few years. I think part of it has been becoming a mom and not having time for other people’s opinions and frankly BS. I think the other part of me is that I see my boys, these beautiful boys who are going to have big dreams. I knew that in order for me to lift them up and help them become who they want to be, I needed to do that for myself.

Since going full time with One Wednesday, one of the biggest questions I’ve been asked is: how did you know it was time and how did you manage turning your side hustle into your career?

The honest answer is: I decided it was time and I made it possible for the next step to be taken (savings included!) I had been waiting for permission for years and once I changed my mindset and became the person who gave myself permission, the people I had been relying on for validation started supporting me the way I needed and wanted. It’s hard to believe in someone when they don’t believe in themself so once I showed up the way that I wanted to feel, even if I didn’t already feel it 100%, the people around me starting to look at me differently. When I said it out loud, they believed me. And I started believing in myself too.