When I had just turned 16 years old, I had a stunning realization. For the first time, I knew my life purpose. After giving a self-confidence empowerment workshop to a group of 8th grade girls, it felt as though God had spoken to me and let me know that I was here to continue the work I was doing on media, body image, mental health, relationships, and more.

At the time, I had no idea what the actual path of my newfound life purpose looked like, but I knew that I had one and that it involved utilizing my passions, public speaking and organizational abilities, and more.

Four years later, it has resulted in co-founding an organization called MOVE, dedicated to empowering young women through workshops and week long summer programs. It has resulted in me publishing a book, giving speeches at several conferences, developing important connections with girls, and much much more.

For the past few years, I have been wholeheartedly and entirely fulfilled. It is to such an extent that my heart was constantly aching with emotion and the understanding that what I was doing was critically important.

The number of times that I have teared up with gratitude and contentedness that I found my belonging is too many to count.

It truly is an indescribably unbelievable feeling to know you are doing the work you are intended to do.

And then, somewhere around the start of this new school year, I started grew restless. For several months, I refused to fully confront it and instead commented on how unfulfilled I felt, without actually doing anything about it.

I hoped that my restlessness would go away, and told myself that when I gave workshops over my college break in January that I would feel better.

Yet, I didn’t feel better. In fact, it forced me to confront the sad but inevitable fact that I am growing and changing, and so was my purpose.

I am in the process of finding fulfillment again. Here’s what I know to be true, and perhaps some ideas on how you too can discover your purpose as I re-discover mine:

Give whatever you can a shot (even if it’s scary)

Growing up, my parents encouraged me to try everything I could. I learned that I hated sports, was not good at playing instruments, that dancing was not for me, singing was okay, and finally that I LOVED doing theater.

I was originally intimidated to try out theater and audition for the school play—so scared that I didn’t audition whatsoever in 6th grade—but conquered that fear a year later to learn that I really found comfort in creating something beautiful with friends.

Trying different things gave me an opportunity to figure out what I liked, and allowed me to develop my strengths in areas that I cared about. Taking the time to learn about and understand myself really benefitted me later on, as my public speaking and teamwork skills are critical to the work I do for MOVE.

So, try everything you possibly can. Especially if you’re a little intimidated to do it. I’ve found that a little fear (within a safe range) allows the most growth to happen.

Run with your ideas.

If you have an idea, take it and run with it. My friends and I decided at age 15 that we wanted to give a workshop, and so we ran with that idea and made it happen.

When I gave the first workshop, I didn’t realize what would follow. I actually thought that I would give one, it would be cool, but that would be that.

Your ideas are worth a shot. They really are. And I encourage you to go for it. I know that social pressure and a desire to fit in make trying out ideas scary, but sometimes you need to put yourself and your ideas before your ego.

Immerse yourself in learning what you care about.

More than that, devote yourself to doing what you care about. Currently, I don’t know what my next purpose is. But, I do know that the way I discovered my original purpose.

I had the idea to write a book, and made it happen, because I took the time to learn first about the issues I cared about. I’m dead serious. Learning led me to understanding, which gave me ideas, and led me to creating my own ideas.

So, I’m spending my time learning about what does currently interest me: Political Science. I am so interested, that I changed my double major from Communication to PoliSci.

I’ve also made it a New Years Resolution to read 25 books on political issues this year. Two done. 23 to go. Speaking of which, the learning that I’ve done already has actually given me the idea for my third book!

Learning about what you care about works. It gives you ideas because you’re able to see what’s missing and you can fill in what’s needed with your own work.

Combine what you’re passionate about, with what you care about, with what you’re good at.

At workshops, I always ask girls to consider the three things above. Previously, and to an extent still, I am passionate about ideas, bringing people together, and more.

I care about body image, media, self-esteem, mental health and more. And I am good at organizing, leading, and public speaking. So, I combined the three to create MOVE.

Today, my strengths and passions are still the same, but what I care about is shifting and I’m starting to consider how I can use what God gave me in another way. All I’m saying is that the more I learn and think about how I can do my part, that honestly running for office has crossed my mind more than a few times.

What are you passionate about? What do you care about? And what are you good at? What is your life purpose?

Now, how can you combine these? If you love it more than your ego, you’ve found it.

And finally, Elizabeth Gilbert describes her home as, “returning to the work of writing because writing was my home, because I loved writing more than I hated failing at writing, which is to say that I loved writing more than I loved my own ego,which is ultimately to say that I loved writing more than I loved myself.”

In other words, Elizabeth Gilbert loved writing more than she hated failing or her own ego.

For so long, I loved MOVE more than my ego. The things people would say to me or behind my back did not matter to me, and I would brush it off easily. Who cares what you think—I’m doing God’s work and nothing can stop me! And in many ways, MOVE is still my home. But I’m moving—or MOVEing—on.

Either way, think about what you love more than your ego. And that’s when you know you’ve found your purpose. To reach out to me, check out www.ashleyolafsen.com

As the student of a Jesuit institution, the art of discernment is not lost on me. When asked “what does it mean to be you” or “what is your defining quality”, there are many things that come to mind. But after thinking through these other characteristics, there is always one characteristic that is at the center of my other favorite personal qualities: kindness.

I will be the first to admit that earlier on in my life, I wasn’t the kindest person I knew. In middle school, I was a completely different person than I am today. Unrecognizable to those who know me now. Even after all the repressed memories from that time in my life, I still remember the person I was, and I refuse to become even a little like I was back then. I changed for the better after my middle school and high school days. In late middle school and early high school, I fell in with a great group of friends who taught me what real friendship was like.

Unfortunately, after losing one of these friends who was bullied and harassed for so long, most of my other friendships fell apart as well. But one thing that I will never forget from my late friend is her kindness. She is the reason that I fight so hard for things like mental health awareness and anti-bullying efforts. She is the reason why I work to be kind to everyone I meet, whether they deserve it or not. She is why I believe that kindness is my defining quality.

When you look up the definition of kindness, you might find something like “the quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate”. But kindness is so much more than something that can be read off a page. Kindness is something that you emulate. Something that you feel in your heart and in your soul. Kindness is often unforgettable. Kindness is a saving grace, and can change someone’s life.

For me, kindness is a way of life, not just a definition or a quality that someone may have. It is a trait that connects me to my friend who died because of all the hate that was sent her way. Kindness is a connecting force: something that makes me feel coupled to another individual. But overall, kindness is a gift that I try to give to every individual that I encounter.

Whether that be going out of my way to help someone out, giving a smile to someone who has temporarily lost theirs, or complimenting strangers who look as if they could use some uplifting words, kindness is a rebellion to the hate and exclusivity that we see too often in our world. Be a rebel. Spread kindness. And always remember, no act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.

I have borderline personality disorder. I have severe bouts of anxiety and depression. I can become erratic and manic in the flip of a switch. I am withdrawn from school. I’m broke. I am in debt to many. But I’m happy.

As I’ve become more and more comfortable opening up about my mental illness and the different ways it has affected me, people that I wouldn’t even consider acquaintances have shown their support to me. It’s shocking, amazing, heart-warming, and overwhelming all at once. To know that a stranger took the time to hear your words, felt sympathy, and came to me with kind words and support. One of the recurring phrases that I was told was that people hoped I would find happiness one day. One day.

It makes sense. On paper, I don’t have much that I should be happy about. But how could I not be totally and completely happy despite my mental illness?

I’m tired of people telling me that they’ll hope I find happiness or that good will come one day. Happiness is here. Good is right now. Despite all of my circumstances,  I have so many reasons to be happy. I have too many beautiful people in my life who help me. The saying “it takes a village” is no fucking joke when literally ever person in my life gets get through my day to day. Some days I’m even overwhelmed with how much happiness I feel.

Yes. Some days are sad. Some days are excruciatingly difficult to get through. Some days it, I can’t wait to just crawl back in bed and go to sleep, just to do it all over again the net day.  But there are so many other days that are joyous. And those are the ones worth sticking around for.

There I was… I sat in the cinema and watched The Magnificent Seven. I sat and watched in awe, but also in terror.

The glamorizing gunshots, explosions, and loud cries kept my eyes and brain glued to the screen; yet there was a part of me that was terrified.

It was the part of me that was in the exact same cinema on July 20, 2012, watching the Dark Knight Rises, in awe of the violence being committed on screen, as it was then unfolding into cries and panicked screams right before my eyes.

Even though there was chaos, confusion, and agony that surrounded me in this moment, it fell silent and shattered my heart.

Before I continue, I would like to give some backstory into who I am. Currently, I am at the age of 20 years old. I was born and raised into a Christian household, so my beliefs and convictions align with the teachings of Jesus Christ and the truth of the Bible.

Yes, most of which that I will be writing about, comes from a place of God in my heart and the experiences that I have faced with Him. But I hope you know that I am not here to preach at you about God, rather, I am here to share a little part of the larger story that He has written for me since the beginning of time. This story is of truth, hope, love, and redemption.

Ask yourself this question and be truthful about the answer. What has been the greatest challenge in life for you to overcome? Now, if you think that you haven’t had to overcome any plight, or if you think that your quarrel was compared to nothing, I would ask you to rethink your reasonings.

The great thing about this question, is that everyone will have a different answer. There is no right or wrong way to navigate this question. We all have different walks of life. This is what makes us unique. Some people are faced with moral dilemmas, some are faced with overcoming injuries, and others with pain and suffering. To each his own.

The greatest challenge I had to overcome was July 20, 2012: The Aurora Theater Shooting.

One man open fired in an auditorium full of human beings, killing 12 and injuring 60. This is not including those who had and still are suffering from various forms of mental illness.

My pain and suffering came in the form of internal stresses. According to the DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders) and my Counselor, I met the criteria for PTSD and Delayed Response, which include depression and anxiety due to the events of that night.

Three months after the shooting, I was in shock. I was going from one thing to the next, without taking the time to stop and ponder what had happened that night. One day, as I was snowshoeing in the silent mountains of Colorado, I felt a boulder drop on me. Not a literal boulder, but an emotional one.

The images, sounds, screams, and smells from that night; It all came rushing through like a tidal wave. I felt guilt instantly and it spoke to me saying, “You got out alive yet there is a little girl who lost her life, and you stood in shock and did nothing to help.” This was every day when I awoke from bed and when I fell to sleep. I put on a façade of happiness when I went to school, but inside I was desperate and crying for help.

Friends and family would ask how I was doing and my response would simply be a complete lie; “I’m fine.”

I then began to think to myself about how I could fix all these internal struggles. How is a 16-year-old supposed to deal and cope with such a trauma? My time as a child and life prior to the event told me to run to Jesus, but there was another part of me, the part of me that is now living this pain and suffering, that told me to run away. So I ran.

How can I run to a God who let such events happen? So, I began to run to worldly pleasures, thinking that they would bring me comfort and fulfillment, but I was naïve, lost, and wrong. This way of thinking and “healing”, ended up bringing me further down the rabbit hole of depression.

Growing up in the church, I always heard that suffering was valuable. It creates perseverance and reliance upon God. I truly believed this, until I experienced it for myself. The only time I would actually call upon God was when I wanted Him to deliver me from these challenges. I was too scared to face the reality of what I was dealing with. So I continued to run from my internal struggles and bottled them up. Eventually… I popped.

I attended counseling for seven months to try and change the way that I thought about that night.

To see it in such a way that is positive, rather than negative. Not every session was great, but not every session was terrible. Progress was happening and change was enacting in my thoughts, but not in my heart. During these times, It was crazy for me to experience the phenomenon of my head and my heart feeling like they were a million miles apart.

My head would say one thing, but my heart would speak another. In my thoughts I knew the truths about God and pain and suffering, but my heart didn’t want to believe it. Depression dug down deep. Lies, anger, and bitterness towards life were tenants who rented out my heart and whose payment was in the form of hate.

I began to ask myself what I wanted to do. It seemed like no matter what I did, I would still feel empty inside. Nothing could fill this shattered, yet naïve heart. Thoughts of suicide began rushing into my head and at one point, I thought it was all I had left. But to escape this suffering by the way of death didn’t seem right to me.

There was this minute piece of light within me that told me there was more to life than pain and suffering. That one day, my life would impact someone.

From the wise words of Friedrich Nietzsche, “He who has a Why to live for, can bear almost any How.”

The truth hit me: the reason for my empty, broken, and desperate heart, was having a lack of purpose to live for.

From the novel, Man’s Search For Meaning, By Viktor E. Frankl, this man attempts to find reason in his pain and suffering, while he endures unnecessary acts of evil during the times of the Holocaust. While I read his experiences in detail, I began to see that pain and suffering is a way of life and that we are promised to cross roads with it.

In Acts 14:22 Luke writes, “Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom.” I don’t want to speak for Viktor, but something tells me he knew this truth. So I began to constitute that, even though I am guaranteed to suffer in life, the only thing that I can do, is change how I see it. James 1:2-4 began to have new meaning for me, “Count it all joy, my brothers and sisters, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. And let perseverance have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

For far too long I chose to only see my current situation, which was agony and pain. I didn’t have a purpose to live, because I wasn’t living for anything except the depression that was killing me. I didn’t look beyond my current situation to see the glory and joy that would come.

Thus began the slow transformation of my heart and the way in which I thought. One of the biggest lies that I believe we as a human race have believed for far too long, is that pain and suffering is the end and there is no moving forward.

I lived this lie for four years too long. As God began to work in my heart over the summer of 2016, he allowed me to experience what positive things can come from pain and suffering.

From the life of Job, this man went through innumerable amounts of pain and suffering, yet at the end of the story, “… the LORD blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning” (Job 42:12). He experienced death and loss from his wife, children, and livestock, but after, God blessed him with more than what he had before. This isn’t the only truth that stands out to me, but there is one more that comes from verse five, chapter 42, “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eyes see you…” What Job is saying is that he never experienced God in a true and intimate way for himself, but because of his pain and suffering, he was able to.

Job began to see God in a new way. His eyes were opened to who God is. Our God that is full of love, glory, majesty, joy, compassion, power, grace, and many more characteristics that my mind cannot fathom. Job experienced this. “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2).

Like Job and his life before pain and suffering, I too had only heard of God. Even after my trauma, I believed that I was worthless, unloveable, foolish, and weak. I believed that I was beyond saving, that I could not come back from this.

I gave up on God, therefore I gave up on life, but do you want to know what the funny thing is? God didn’t give up on me.

Even after running from him for four years, never truly knowing him before my suffering, and living in constant sin; He still loved and wanted me.

I saw and experienced His relentless pursuit and commitment of love and grace for my heart. I finally SAW the truth that God is love and He wants good things for me. Therefore, I stopped asking God to take away the pain and suffering and instead, I asked him to help me see it in a new way and to walk with me through it.

I came to this conclusion that, it didn’t matter what I expected from God or this crazy thing called life, but rather what God and life expected of me. To be in an intimate relationship with Him and to live my life as a light to those who are in a dark place.

Now it all comes back to the question I had asked earlier in my writing, “what has been the greatest challenge for you to overcome?”

By this time, I’m sure you have an answer, but I want to add a little more to this question… “and how did you overcome this?” Some of your answers may be like mine where you chose to let it defeat you, for others it may be that you whizzed on by with no problem, but for the rest, you haven’t faced it.

God has allowed me to experience such a trauma that I would have never dreamt of facing, but through this, I have come out on the other side as a testament to God’s faithfulness and to the truth that pain and suffering is a gift… because I now see the beauty in life and God.

The hope of my writing and experience is to illustrate that when pain and suffering comes, you shouldn’t run away out of fear or let it defeat you like I did. Rather, you should run head on toward the challenge and face it.

To quote Viktor Frankl once more, “Emotion, which is suffering, ceases to be suffering as soon as we form a clear and precise picture of it.” Now, while you run head on into pain and suffering, know that God is with you every step of the way and that this momentary affliction, is no match for the glory that will follow.

“Sometimes the only way around suffering is to go straight through it.” -Anonymous

I identify myself as a creative mind, getting to look at things through a lens that’s more abstract than not.

Growing up, I idolized my older sister. She’s one of my best friends and biggest influencers. Since I can remember, she has encouraged me to try new things and not to be afraid of failure. She went on to study art in college, making and creating, and I was always really inspired by her drive and zeal to try new things.

Art is something that I carry closely. It’s a language all it’s own and I am in constant pursuit to know that language better. For the longest time, I was intimidated because I wasn’t studying it like my sister, so I automatically counted myself out.

But I loved drawing. Doodling. Looking at things and thinking about how it would look through different lenses. All of it, deconstructed lines that come together to create something beautiful.

I have the vision, so I need to dive head-first!

Growing up, my story wasn’t something people were really interested in. Sure, my family was interested, but that pivotal time that is “middle school” I felt really alone. After having people be truly interested in me, my heart, and my dreams, I wanted to be the person to love on people and show them that their story is important and needs to be heard, because every story is important.

Showing Up Naked is a book that goes to the root of the art of deconstructed story telling. Raw, true accounts from people you and I can Identify with. The people writing are people you and I interact with on the daily, and it’s a beautiful thing to see that the only thing that separates us is a simple ice-breaker conversation.

So why the doors? Every heart and soul of a person is so unique and different from the next, yet more important than anything. The people that get to look through the window of my soul aren’t that many, but when they do, I imagine the outside looks like a little house, with a cute little door and a welcome mat, complete with a key underneath. Getting in may be easy, but getting to the entrance is harder than you may think.

My inspiration was to create a series of doors that are all unique in some way, shape, or form, in color and style, just like the stories that will reside in the book, written by people like you and me. They are organic, deconstructed, and simple. They have character, but aren’t hard to look at. They are the doors you walk through to read these stories in a raw, real, understanding way. I see a lot of myself in these doors, imperfect, but filled with a lot of stories that make me who I am, and that Jesus loves my stories, regardless of how imperfect the door to my heart is.

Art is a way for me to express myself. In anything and everything I do, I get to look at it through a lens that sees things a little differently– an abstract, simple, real lens that sees the people and the story first.

Vote on Kelsey’s cover using the link below!

“PLEASE READ.” Simple, straightforward, and sharp, these words seem so insignificant. Yet, they completely changed MY outlook on life and my hope is that they can change YOURS.

When I was 16 I attended a leadership conference where I was told to write down a goal and mine was that I wanted to be a journalist. But then they threw me a loop by telling me to plan out all of the things I would be doing THAT VERY MONTH to get closer to achieving that goal. I was baffled.

When you’re an adult, I thought, that is when you chase your dreams.

When you’re an adult, that is when you do big things. Most importantly, when you’re an adult, that is when you can become a journalist. But after that workshop, I was INSPIRED. I went online and found the e-mail addresses of newspaper editors throughout the nation and sent them all a desperate e-mail labeled “PLEASE READ’’ in capital letters, begging for any opportunity available. Yet, many replied only to tell me how it was “oh so cute” that I had reached out and to contact them again when I was older.

Others did not reply at all. As you can imagine, I was beginning to feel deflated. I was a popped balloon, all of my hope leaking from my body, floating away into an abyss that we call space. I thought I had no chance. I could feel my dream slipping from my grasp, and I didn’t know what I could possibly do to keep my hold on it. But just as I was reaching the ultimate despair, I received an e-mail from an editor at the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Her response was simple. “I like your sass,” she said. “Send me your stuff.”

So I did. And to summarize, I began writing for the newspaper in my home city, with some of my articles even appearing on the front page of their respective sections. But that’s enough about me. That is not the point of this conversation. The real point of this conversation is that we need to begin taking control of our lives and destinies every single day, and this is so important now as college students.

If there’s a class you want to take but don’t have the prerequisites, e-mail the teacher, meet with the department, and do your best to secure your spot. If there’s a guy or girl that you’re into, talk to them, get their number, and ask them out.

Stop waiting for something to happen and go MAKE it happen. The example I always give to my friend is to imagine that you are in line at Starbucks. People might be able to assume that you’re waiting for coffee, but until you actually get the courage to go up that counter and ASK for some, there won’t be ANY coffee in YOUR hands. So take a chance and be bold, because sometime’s that’s as simple as merely sending an e-mail labeled “PLEASE READ.”

Jessica is also part of a phenomenal organization all AIESEC. In conjunction with our partnership with their organization, please see their blog here!

There’s a huge misconception these days with us millennials. The problem is that all of us seem to think that our generation has such a strong entrepreneurial movement. In reality, what I believe, is that every generation has always had that same drive to change the world, it is just our human nature to want to make a difference.

But, our generation stands out more because we talk about it more. What I mean is that everyone always TALKS about the big things they want to do, but they don’t have the corresponding actions that are as big as their words.

There seems to be a gap between the people who talk all the time about it, and the people who end up doing what they said they did. In saying this I am not writing to discourage any of the readers from pursuing whatever dreams they may have, but rather encourage you to DO what you freaking want to do.

Here is what discourages a lot of people and stops them from making it. ITS NOT AS EASY AS IT SOUNDS. It is just so common to say that someone wants to start their own business and “fire their boss.”

People say that building your dream business is not an elevator, but it’s a staircase. I FULLY DISAGREE. Staircases are harder, but they are ALWAYS going upward. The journey to success is far from a straight path. So let me summarize what my journey has looked like so far and I hope it will give you the inspiration to push past whatever hardships you think you’re going through and understand that it is all worth it.

It all began 5 years ago, I was sitting with my father and we discussed what, at the time, I thought was a terrible idea. I thought this in the back of my head but at the same time, I was able to look past that and picture what this small idea COULD become. It was an idea to somehow change the world, from a driving perspective. We wanted to leave a dent in the world and reduce driving accidents everywhere.

Our family had someone close lose his life to a dangerous driver and my father was determined to stop this from happening to any other family if he could. If anyone has lost someone to a car accident, you will understand the value of saving even ONE MORE life a year can have to hundreds of people. It began with a town in Lebanon.

We constructed an outdoor city where we tried our best to introduce driving rules and safety to kids at a young age. I thought “Why would a child want to drive by the rules when they could just drive recklessly?”

It was great at first, business was booming and all we saw was a taste of the success we dreamed of it creating.

Then the next year came around, and we got a taste of what it is like to lose it all. Slow days became slow weeks and then became slow months. Business became the nightmare that everyone wants to quit on. Employee theft occurred, customer ratings dropped, and obviously the revenue took a bigger hit then even Ray Rice could dish out. Too soon? Yeah my bad.
The next 4 years looked something like this:

• Spend money
• Lose money
• Find investors
• Lose investors
• Spend more money
• Lose even more money
• Want to quit
• Still want to quit
• Don’t quit
• REPEAT

We attended every expo for the industry. Spend countless amounts of hours and money on trips to Dubai, Europe, California, the Middle East, China, and Cali. All these trips were not for fun, and not one dollar came out of them, but to say the least a lot went in. Banks accounts looked low and it all looked like a waste of time. We were trying to bring the idea to America, but we didn’t have the money, especially now, or the selling point.

JUST as it seemed like it was time to give up, my partner told me that it was too far to give up on this dream, so we pushed…another 6 months. And just as it looked like it was the end, it all fell through in a matter of a week.

Investors starting blowing up our email accounts asking to be the first and we suddenly went from not enough to too much. So the first location opened up in July 2014 in Norcross, Ga. The dream has been finally manifested into a tangible reality. After all this leading up to this point, we had JUST started.

It took all this to make the business just OPEN. Fortunately in the first 6 months we have been awarded the best business by the City of Norcross. Something I learned on this journey is that If you have 6 hours to chop a tree down, it’s a lot smarter to sharpen your axe for most the time then cut then just start cutting.

Many people have an “idea” of where they want to be, but they don’t have the goal in mind. Imagine you start a road trip in GA. And you have no idea where you want to go, it would take you forever to finally get where you want to. You would have no idea what turns to take. Then compare that to a road trip where you began in GA and you know you want to get to Las Vegas. This time, even without a map, you will know which turns to take.

Every time to roads change, you’ll know exactly where to turn because you have visualized the destination.

This is how success operates. If you do not know what you want, you WILL NEVER GET IT. The business world is the fairest playing field. If you do not make a goal, you will never score. So I encourage you to make that goal, although it may change along the way. Time will change and your goal will do so with it, but running stray and hoping to live financially free one day is like being blindfolded and trying to drive somewhere.

One last thing before I end this article. If you have an idea for a business that you want to make. GO MAKE IT. DO WHATEVER YOU CAN DO TO MAKE IT HAPPEN. Your mom, dad, friends, or you tell you its stupid then work twice as hard and prove them wrong.

If YOU think it is a good idea then I guarantee you there are plenty of people, out of the 7+ billion, that think its an amazing idea as well and are willing to be your customers. Just understand it isn’t a staircase, it isn’t an elevator, it isn’t a mountain climb. It is its own game.

And just when you think its not going to happen it does. So just like in sports or in the gym, when you want to give up, give yourself just as much time as you already have given to keep going. AND YOU MUST BE OBSESSED WITH IT. Because it will drive you crazy and if you don’t love it it will fail. IF YOU ARE OBSESSED, you will love the sleepless nights, you will love working 30 hours straight, and you will love every second of time spent.

So find what it is that makes you feel this way and create it, because you only have so many years to change this world. Start now and dent this planet in your own way. Who cares what others think, because once its done, everyone will be inspired by you and that in itself is enough to spark a change in this world.

Challenges arise in everyone’s life. Knowing how to face them and how to learn from them separates those who overcome a challenge from those who do not.

I proudly swim for the University of Georgia, which happens to be one of the foremost dominant programs in the nation, winning two NCAA championships in the past three years. Being a student-athlete at UGA, I know that challenges are present every day, whether in the form of a practice that appears insurmountable or studying for a dreaded exam.

Facing certain challenges can cause stress and frustration, which I have recent experience in. This past December I underwent surgery on my right shoulder and nothing has been more frustrating than coping with the injury before surgery and with the recovery process that ensued. Despite the irritating frustration and incredible challenge, this experience has been the most rewarding in my life thus far.

I have always been involved in many sports, but I chose to continue with swimming in order to pursue a collegiate career.

Throughout the many sports that I’ve participated in, including track and tennis, I had only ever been injured once with stress fractures. That changed during the summer of 2014 over Fourth of July weekend. I rarely go to lakes or do things that could potentially harm my being an athlete, but that weekend I decided to have some fun and go to my friend’s lake house.

Though I only went inner-tubing twice over the three days of being there, that second time was enough to cause an injury. Though I didn’t want to admit it, I remember feeling a jerking within my shoulder when I tried to hang onto the inner-tube while the speedboat flung me into the air off a wave.

I didn’t fall off, but my shoulder sure wanted to.

The rest of the weekend I just “relaxed” on the boat while trying to shake off the dull throbbing pain in my shoulder. If you don’t know anything about the sport of swimming, just know that having any shoulder injury is very bad.

Swimmers complete miles in the pool every day with a constant repetitive rotation of our shoulders, which puts a lot of stress on the joint and surrounding muscles. Any injury, however minor, is a threat to a swimmer’s career.

After that weekend, I spent about a month modifying my training in order to tolerate practices. Unbeknownst to me, my bicep tried compensating for the lack of strength in my shoulder; so when I went to see a doctor, I was diagnosed with having bicep tendonitis, which was true, but not the main problem.

I had two weeks before I moved to Athens.

During those weeks I took time out of the pool solely to rehab my bicep tendon. By the time I arrived to UGA, the tendonitis was much better, but not gone. Furthermore, right when I started practicing with the team my shoulder immediately flared back up, and my tendon was still a bit inflamed. No amount of rehabilitation was able to improve my shoulder, so in early September I went in for an MRI.

Turns out I had distal clavicular osteolysis from separating my AC joint. The only logical response to this was to say that I did it on that inner-tube on July 4th. I knew that because the pain started from that day forward.

From the separation and osteolysis, I had bone spurs that took up the majority of my joint space, causing a bone-on-bone grinding action every time I moved my arm in the pool. This explained why my shoulder hurt every time I took a stroke at practice.

Knowing my true injury, I spent my entire first semester at UGA in limbo and in constant frustration, trying to avoid the inevitable decision to say yes to shoulder surgery.

With this injury, surgery was the only way it could be fixed. This fact frustrated me more than anything. Coming into UGA, I had the mindset of training harder than ever in order to improve in my sport and in my overall health. However, my shoulder inhibited me from doing that. I couldn’t give 100% because my shoulder wouldn’t allow it.

Since my shoulder restrained me, I was held back from competition throughout the fall. To me, nothing is more frustrating than being restricted. Seeing my team train and compete without me was defeating. As a temporary solution, I received a cortisone injection into my AC joint. After that didn’t help, I faced the inevitable and decided to schedule shoulder surgery, knowing my first season would be a flop.

Luckily, my coaches graciously allowed me to take a medical redshirt, which would save my first year of eligibility, giving me the opportunity to start anew as a freshman in the fall of 2015. Knowing this gave me some of my inner peace back while trying to cope with the recovery process. After having surgery in December 2014, I came to discover many things about myself and about my sport, which I would have only known through this injury.

Swimming is not my life. Though many athletes come to college just for their sport, we are first and foremost students.

One’s sport should be a stepping-stone into learning and preparing for later things in life. Being an athlete requires one to overcome difficult practices, recover from a failure, manage success with humility, and understand time management. I’ve always had good time management, but with my injury I had more free time than ever, and I realized how easily I could take my free time for granted.

Instead of using time to study, it could casually be thrown away by watching TV, partying, or just simply procrastinating. I wasted some of this time by doing those things, discovering later that the new extra time that I had was an opportunity to improve.

Having this extra time, I dedicated much of it to my studies and improved my grades as the semester went on. My injury, therefore, taught me how to manage my time more efficiently and delegate more of it to studying.

I realized what my actual goals were in life (at least for now). Being injured is awful, but it made me realize how badly I wanted to improve as an athlete. From December to March, I couldn’t swim. Before my injury, the longest time I had been out of the water from training was two weeks, so this lapse in my training was extremely tough to adjust to.

Each day I did cardio in the gym that overlooks the pool that my team practices in. Seeing my team practice every day was frustrating because I was not with them, but seeing them practice made me want to do everything in my power to get my shoulder healthy and get back in the pool as quickly as possible.

Not being able to swim gave me the hunger I needed to drive my passion to improve.

This passion didn’t only apply to the pool however—my desire to improve carried over into my academics and future goals as well. I had a lot of time to think while doing cardio every day, and my thoughts turned into the goals, both long-term and short-term, that I am striving to reach.

Most important to me, I realized the importance of adjusting to and overcoming adversity. I have faced many failures, as well as successes, throughout the sport of swimming. Even when I thought a certain failure was the end of the world, it wasn’t.

From having numerous conversations with my family, my dad in particular, and my coach, I learned that what matters most is how one addresses the failure or setback and works to overcome and learn from it.

Recovering from surgery has not been easy, but all of the challenges that I’ve faced along the way this past half year have been worthwhile and eye opening. Though the first couple of days after my surgery were painful and it seemed that it would take a lifetime to recover, here I am six months later about to compete for the first time in almost eight months.

No matter how daunting a challenge or task may seem, there is always a way to complete and overcome it—it just takes patience and determination.

My injury, and the long recovery process, changed the way I think about my college experience, my goals, and most importantly, myself. Though it was extremely frustrating and taxing, the experience has been a blessing in disguise.

Now, I am willing to work harder than before because I know what I want to accomplish in my collegiate career as an athlete and in my lifetime. Every challenge has its obstacles and doubts, but I now look past those and seek the positives within each test, because I know that I have the strength and determination to overcome any challenge and trial that I put my mind to.

Leadership. This is a buzzword we hear time and again each day. Leaders are what so many of us aspire to be, and especially in college, there is a huge push for students to gain these so-called leadership skills. However, I think we have a nationwide problem in this push for leadership.

Yes, almost all of us hope to be a leader in some regard, whether that be through aspirations of President of the United States or president of your Homeowner’s Association. Granted, many of these so-called leadership skills are influential in life, such as the ability to convey information, delegate tasks, and present yourself well. Yet at the same time, the world simply cannot be a world full of leaders, and there is almost a fundamental problem with everyone wanting to take charge because simply put, leaders need followers.

That doesn’t mean by any standards that you are less important or beneath those who are in leadership positions by being a “follower,” but rather a fundamental component of what makes up the organization you are a part of. I just feel we are all being melded into this picturesque “perfect” individual who not only looks the part, but has excellent social and leadership skills.

Yet that isn’t realistic, and not only is it not realistic, but it is not what we should all be striving for.

It is the quite researchers who are introspective and make brilliant discoveries, the authors who sit behind a computer screen and provide the world with new ideas, the engineers that build and design and create, who all compose and contribute greatly to our society all without having to be your “leader.”

What I am trying to say is that I think we need to take some of that pressure off in the way we are continually pushing leadership in college and society and even the workplace, because sometimes it is the quiet and introspective individuals, the ones who may follow, or simply the ones who keep to themselves, who make an even greater difference in society – and they are happy while doing it.

Leadership is necessary in many instances, and we definitely do need great leaders in society, that is without a doubt, but just because that isn’t the mold you fit into doesn’t mean that there is anything wrong with the path that you are taking in life.

Everyone has challenges. Savannah’s spine is twisted so much that her diaphragm on one side can’t punch her lung to get gunk out … on top of that her body is too weak to cough with enough force anyway.

She had to stay home from school today because she coughs incessantly when she gets just a little gunk in her lungs. The attached picture is of her using her cough assist machine to suck gunk out.

We spent a week at Duke University a few months ago as a part of the Undiagnosed Diseases Network. For five days, 10-12 hours per day, we met with doctors, reviewed data from the almost 10 other major hospitals Savannah has visited since she was born, and of course they conducted X-rays, drew blood, told her to cough harder, harder, harder into a tube over, and over, and over again. And they are still stumped. It’s genetic, but we know nothing more than that.

But it’s not a sad story. It’s a challenge.

And everyone has them. Life can be hard. Overwhelming. The unknown can be scary. Watching someone suffer or being the one suffering can break your heart, weigh you down, and feel like it is too much to handle. But it’s not about the challenges; everyone has challenges. It’s about how we live through them.

Savannah lives really well through her challenges and in doing so she inspires me to do the same. She’s not just tough; she is faithful (full of faith). I am sharing this so that you can know that we all have challenges in our lives. Savannah inspires me and I want to help her amplify the voice of her life so she can inspire you too.

Don’t allow the challenges to win. Live well through them; not only will you be happy you did but you’ll inspire others to do the same!