Everyone tells you to make the most of your year, your life, chase your dreams. No one tells you the ugly truth of how hard it is. But what they also do not tell you is how rewarding it is.
Growing your own business, sounds easy right? Be great at what you do, work under no one, follow the rules and guidelines that you not only believe in but created. While all of that is true so is this: it is terrifyingly hard. I have spent the past 6 months on my own. No boss, no co-workers, alone. Of course, I did have help along the way, friends to guide me and contractors to hire out. But none of them were on the line like I was. It was my business, my career, my future, my dream. I worked harder and longer than I ever had, and I am still working. I am still forging my own path full of victories and challenges.
What exactly does it mean to chase your dreams? For me it was start my own business. What I failed to realize on the onset was that chasing your dreams comes at a price and if you truly believe in yourself, you pay anything. I could go on about the financial burden or the stress. But what I want to focus on the personal changes. Through this process I have learned so much about myself and have changed and grown. I am not the same person I was 6 months ago let alone a year ago. I am stronger, more diligent, less trusting, more focused. I have had my faith and belief in myself tested time and time again. I am no longer just a 23-year-old. I am an entrepreneur; a business owner slash web-designer slash creative director slash planner slash buyer slash everything. Just Hitched is my life, I eat sleep and breathe this business. Everything I do, every step I take is to grow and become even a fraction of a step closer. And along the way I have learned lessons, hard ones not only about business but friends and trust and myself.
Don’t just follow your dreams, chase them. Run as hard and as long as you can into the foggy path in front of you. The path to your dreams is long and winding and uphill, but it is worth it at every step. One day you will emerge on the other side and be able to look back with picture perfect clarity at all of your trials and realize one important thing: you made it. The reality you live, is your long-ago dream and when that happens, dream again; dream bigger and bolder than before. Then start running.
