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

At the time, I thought it was a sign that I never got an actual acceptance letter to Virginia Tech. I remember logging onto the application site one night at the request of my high school counselor; I glanced quickly across the screen, trying to find the proper button to hit to get me where I needed to go.

My gaze slid to a stop when I saw the words, “pay your deposit here,” in the middle of the screen in all-caps. It was such an insignificant moment; I wasn’t anxiously slitting open a thick envelope shaking with excitement, a moment so many of my friends talk about fondly.

I was staring at a glowing laptop screen that—despite the lack of the word, “congratulations,” was telling me that I had been accepted to Virginia Tech—and I felt nothing. I never wanted to go to Virginia Tech; I never even considered applying until my older brother, a freshman at Tech while I was applying to schools, begged me to apply. Even my parents, both alumni of the University of Virginia, told me I had to apply, that it would be a mistake if I didn’t.

My heart was dead-set on another college, but because my family insisted, I applied to Virginia Tech with what could only be described as a begrudging attitude.

Spring rolled around and for one of the first times in my life, so did the rejections; one after another came in, each one with the worst anxiety-riddled word stamped on the pages: waitlisted. Was it worse to be not wanted at all or to be pushed into the category of “you’re not quite good enough”? It felt like being told that I had all the qualifications, but unfortunately didn’t stand out enough to make the cut. I wasn’t special enough.

Before I knew it, I had little to no options and I found myself for the first time facing the possibility of something I had never considered: going to Virginia Tech. Everyone I knew that went to Virginia Tech told me to wait—wait for that moment, they said. You’ll fall in love with Virginia Tech. Just wait until you get to campus. I waited. I went to orientation, had the most incredible orientation leader in the world, and had as good of a time as anyone could have at orientation. But I left with a pit in my stomach; yes, my orientation leader had made me excited about going to college, but I wasn’t excited about where I was going to college.

Though I had heard people talking about going to something called Hokie Camp, I didn’t even bother looking into it—why would I want to go to another experience like orientation where I would be surrounded by people who were in love with Virginia Tech? I’m one of the most outgoing people I know, but I also knew that I could be very good at putting on a front so as to appear like I fit in. I didn’t want to start putting up my fake “I love Virginia Tech” front before classes even started.

So I waited until I got to campus. The entire first semester, my thoughts constantly shifted between knowing that I was loving the college experience in general and knowing that if I was honest with myself, I was unhappy. I didn’t want to be at Virginia Tech; it was so hard to change my mindset from having my heart set on one school my whole life to being thrown into a sea of die hard Hokies. I hated the idea of being a failure though and I didn’t want to think that I failed at Virginia Tech, so I tried everything I could to give Tech a chance. I got into a freshmen leadership program, I joined a sorority, I met some of the most life changing people I’d ever known.

I put up the front of being the most dedicated, in love Hokie you’ve ever met, hoping that if I faked it enough it would become true.

All the while, I had a half filled out transfer application saved on my laptop. There’s a cheesy quote out there that says something along the lines of, “I fell in love the way you fall asleep; slowly, and then all at once.”

I fell in love with Virginia Tech very, very, very slowly (painfully slow)—and then all at once. The slowly part was over the course of my first two years at Virginia Tech. I began to learn that the walls I had built had been constructed from heartbreak; heartbreak that had stemmed from expectations. I had been shutting myself off because of the expectations I had held in my head about where I was supposed to be, and how it was supposed to be. Bit by bit, or more accurately, person by person, I began to see what everyone had been telling me to wait for. I stopped working on my transfer application and instead began spending all my free time looking up to these incredible people I was lucky enough to have for mentors.

These people were Virginia Tech for me. When I wasn’t in love with Virginia Tech, when I couldn’t see past the walls I had built up for so long, they showed me how to open myself up and how to let Virginia Tech love me, so that I could love it. The all at once part happened at Hokie Camp. During my sophomore year, I was hit by how far I had come since crying to my mom on the phone at night when I was a freshman. I realized that the only reason I had stayed was because of my mentors that had made Tech home. I had found reasons to stay, but it took me a while to find them because of all the walls I had built up. I thought to myself, if I could shorten the amount of time it takes for even one incoming student to find their reasons to stay, than everything would be worth it.

That’s how I found myself standing at Smith Mountain Lake on August 10th, 2014, falling in love with Virginia Tech, all at once.

Over the course of four training semesters, two summers, 22 days, and five Hokie Camp campfires, I found myself falling in love with Virginia Tech so quickly and so repeatedly that I felt my heart could burst. Being at Hokie Camp was like being in the most pure form of the Virginia Tech community—I was surrounded by everything that I had been waiting for, and I got to experience it alongside students who were discovering that feeling for the first time.

Every minute I spent at Hokie Camp, all I could think about was channeling the strength and love I had learned from my mentors and trying to find a way to pass those feelings down. All I ever wanted was to convey that no matter where you were on the road to falling in love with Virginia Tech—no matter how in love you were, or how against it you felt—that all you had to do was stay. Wait for those people that could show you how to let Virginia Tech love you.

My whole heart ached with the hope that these students, having already taken their first step by going to Hokie Camp, could leave for school having found even one of those people.

Today, nothing makes me feel more at home at Virginia Tech than when I see Hokie campers on campus with their people. Nothing has ever given me more joy than hearing two weeks, or two years, down the road how in love they are with Virginia Tech. I was lucky enough to find my people, and lucky enough to have them save me from leaving a school that has become a part of my very being.

I’ve been even luckier to have 22 days of helping incoming students fall in love with Virginia Tech. I was extraordinarily blessed to have experienced the majority of those 22 days with 13 people who held inside each of them the love and selflessness that makes people fall head over heels for Virginia Tech. I wouldn’t be as deeply in love with Virginia Tech if it weren’t for the people that helped me on the road to becoming the person I had always aspired to be. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I never once imagined myself coming to Virginia Tech; I wasted so much time planning when I could leave, asking myself if I was out of the woods yet.

I never would have expected finding my home, right there, in the woods. Looking at it now, I’ve never been happier to have been so wrong.

What is purpose? Honestly, there may be definitions on google that might tell you what purpose means. But let’s all be real; the dentition on google isn’t always true. 

All those songs, movies, artsy tumblr posts, and Bible verses can sometimes show you that people have a purpose, but what if you can’t find your purpose? That always comes to my mind.

People always tell you that you are put on this earth to do something great. And I am not saying that isn’t true, but right now I am having trouble finding that purpose and discovering what I was put on this earth to do. I may still be a kid or teenager or whatever they call me, but that doesn’t stop me from trying to find it.

Honestly, I know that I wasn’t put on this earth for something related to school and that is fine with me.

But when I walk around school, I see all these kids that are so smart, and I can tell which kids have a bright future. I can see it in my friends too.

In school, they say that everyone’s their own kinda smart, but sometimes I don’t see it like that. Is it wrong to think that? Because I struggle with math, I have been in this program called literacy math since 6th grade, and I have always been so embarrassed about it.

School really scares me, but i have realized school isn’t my thing. And it will never be my thing, and I just have to learn to accept it.

I have plans for myself, but I am scared to grow up because I know that my future is coming. Sometimes I think of it like a movie that is in the making, and when its done, it will be shown in theater. You don’t want to have a 1 star movie do you? You also don’t want to have a one star life. That might sound crazy but that is how I think about it sometimes.

Life is scary. And school is scary. And so is finding your purpose, but here is what I have learned: it doesn’t matter how smart you are, how pretty you are, how funny you are, how popular you are. In the long run, it just matters who you are.

And that might be weird to think about, but I am still teaching myself to stop trying to be someone I am not and just be the person I am.

For a while, I tried to hang out with the “popular” people because I wanted to people to think that I was cool. I got so caught up with this until I realized that I didn’t fit in with them.

I am honestly so glad I stopped trying to be this person that I wasn’t. God blessed me with the most amazing friends and family I could ever ask for, and they accept me for who I am.

It might be super cheesy, but we were put on this world for something great. So start chasing that instead of chasing the person you want to be. Just be the person who you are and live in the moment with that person. That is what purpose is.

Be the person who you are because everybody needs a little bit of you and your qualities in this word, believe it or not. So forget the person who you wish you were, and be the person who you truly are. And you will find your purpose somewhere.

What is your most valuable resource?

Some answers might vary to scarce resources like coal or oil or natural gas, some might say money, some might say people. I say time.

Everyone has the same amount but everyone uses theirs differently. You cannot exchange it or return it.

You cannot go back. You cannot go forward. Once it is gone, it’s gone. I think time is the most valuable thing people can spend. I think so many people use time as a crutch instead of a tool. If you use your time with resentment or envy, you’ll be disappointed. But if you cherish it and spend it in a positive light, I really do think you will live a fuller life. I compare my freshman year of college versus my senior year of college.

Freshman year I had all the time in the world. How did I spend it? Going out late, catching up on sleep the next day, watching movies, mindlessly playing on my phone. Now here I am a senior wondering if I had more hours in the day as a freshman. Yes this is due to the fact that I got more involved, but I just cherish my time so much more now. I think the past few years have shed light on how valuable of a resource time really is.

UGA Relay For Life has been a major factor in this. My friend found out her dad had stage 4 cancer a while back.

He died just recently.

I cannot wrap my mind around that because it is so hard to imagine. You hear horror stories of it all the time, but it is not until it personally effects you that you begin to take notice. I think it is so sad that it takes something like this for people to realize how important our cause is and why we do what we do.

This is when it really hits home.

That is the thing about time. You cannot borrow time. You cannot gain any more time. It expires everyday. What you do in that span is so important because it is a day you will never get back.

Coach Joni Taylor, the head Women’s Basketball Coach at the University of Georgia, came to speak at an exec meeting and I will never forget what she said. She stated, “if you are still thinking about what you did yesterday then you have not done enough today.”

That really struck me. I used to make to do lists with things I wanted to accomplish and I would just say “If I can just make it through today, I’ll be good. Tomorrow I can rest and relax.” And while I do think it is important to take a break from this stressful time of life, I think it is important to keep moving forward and to keep pushing yourself. I hate when people say “I don’t have time.” There is a difference between not having time and not making time.

If there is one thing I learned throughout my three and a half years at Georgia so far, it is to make the time. If you commit to something, make sure you make the time. If someone asks for help, make the time.

Don’t cancel plans. Don’t flake. Spend time with friends and family. Spend time with teachers. Spend time with classmates. Support your friends’ causes and efforts. I’ve learned that just making the effort and making the time goes a long way. I think making people realize how valuable a resource time is is tricky because it is not necessarily tangible. You can’t do anything with it but spend it. You just have to choose what you spend it on.

In my last few months here in Athens, I devote myself to not wasting a minute of my time when it could be spent towards something much more meaningful.

FROM CRUMBS TO BRICKS will always be my motto – something I can call my own, to hold onto me; something from nothing.

I was raised with 13 brothers and sisters. At age five I was molested by friends and family. Child Protective Services yanked me from home and dumped me at a shelter. I’ll be safe here.

While residing at the shelter, again it happened, it was the older teens living at the shelter. At this point yeah I feel lost, lonely, and most of all confused about my situation.

Why so many people? Why always to me?

Yes, yes, yes. I’m free. Moving to a nice foster home. I’ll be safe. The same things kept happening there. I was afraid to tell anyone, mostly uncomfortable and embarrassed. Beginning to stay to myself, now blaming myself, scared.

Finally, I was out of the foster care system. My mom couldn’t get custody so I was placed with my aunt. Jesus, at 13 my brother drugged me and had sex with me. Will it ever end!

I met my dad when he came to visit one day when I was in foster care. After a year with my aunt I moved in with him – he’s the pastor of Mt. Vernon Baptist church in Houston.

This is the turning point in my life.

I fell in love with music. It seemed to be the only thing that would make me forget about any and everything and gave me peace. I started singing in the choir faithfully. But even though I love to sing and clap it was something about those drums. I’ve never taken any lessons before but always felt I had what it took.

I started playing after church all the time and the elders always would run me off the drums saying stop making all that noise! I guess they really didn’t understand my gift that was being born within me at that time.

One day the drummer didn’t show up at church, guess who was there? Me! I played a real simple beat that I had been practicing before, thank God it worked because I started playing for the youth choir after that!

From there my love for music grew. I started playing drums more and more. The more I play the happier my life seemed to be. Since then my life has been on a positive turn because of my motivation, my love for what I do which is my gift of music, and my determination to be something in life.

I’ve had a lot of doors open in my favor that I never would have had if I hadn’t started believing in myself and picking up my self esteem. I’ve come a long way but I didn’t do it by myself. With prayer and my drums nothing is impossible.

The reason I say crumbs to bricks is because at one time I believed that I was crumbs.

I was shattered into pieces. I felt I was nothing. But now my spirit is rejuvenated! Those pieces are now a strong beautiful woman and I’m stronger than I was before. I stay positive, driven, and motivated in everything I do and positive things always come back to me.

Along with my music I am aiming toward being a mortician and fire fighter. I also hope to one day meet new wonderful people and be an inspiration for young woman to be strong internally and follow their dreams.

I don’t want this to happen to anyone anymore. I want to be something more – like Cindy Blackman.

So my question for you is do you know what you want to do for the rest of your life?

You do you say? Well, really… Are you sure that even 20 or even 1 year down the line you will still call that your dream job? You see, I am dubious of anyone who says they have their entire life figured out. Not because there aren’t people with genuine passions and skills, but simply because people are dynamic.

People change.

And their goals and dreams change with them. I don’t know about you, but I constantly change my mind and have doubts about whether the route I am currently pursuing is the right one for me. To be honest, I don’t know if I have ever been completely sure of my life path.

Here’s an excerpt from junior year of high school to prove my point: “How is anyone supposed to really know what they want to do? There are literally millions of opportunities out there, thousands of colleges, hundreds of majors, and one of me. Sure, there are the things I’m good at, pretty much just school, and the things I sort of like, chorus and softball, but how are you just supposed to know at what you will succeed?

“What if I put in the hard time to become a doctor and find out I’m squeamish or go through dental school to discover I hate teeth? What if I just haven’t been exposed to my true passion? Lately, people have asked me where I want to go, but is that really the question?”

It’s funny to me a little bit because I’m sure to outsiders it looks like I have my entire life figured out. I’m in college, picked a major, and I even have work experience and research under my belt. From my perspective, though, I feel as if I am blindly trucking on, following a slight inclination for which I am not entirely sure about.

I call it a quarter-life crisis, and if you haven’t had one, I’m sure you will.

It may not even be school-related. Maybe you are with a guy you have been dating for years, but just aren’t sure if he’s the one, or you have the opportunity to take a job or internship in a new city but can’t decide whether to stay or go. These are the times when it really is tough because we are literally making decisions that alter the entirety of our one life we have been given.

Now I haven’t entirely figured out what to do in these situations either, but I will tell you that the only thing that keeps me sane is knowing that I have the power to change my mind. I have the power to quit a job if I want to, to pick up and start anew elsewhere, to even go back to school and change my major or get a new degree if that is something that I need to do.

In the moment you start to see yourself as stagnant or stuck on this pathway of life, things start to get scary. However, there is ALWAYS the opportunity to find a new passion and rediscover yourself.

Having that internal locus of control, that attitude that it is you who makes decisions about where you are going with your life and not just random chance and circumstances, will get you far. Yes, there are limitations like money and time and relationships, and those are definitely factors, but that still doesn’t mean you don’t have the ability to make a change on the pathway of life.

You can backtrack, change directions, or be truly brave and have your own path. I know it sounds a bit cliche, and to be honest, it is. But that is the reality of it as well.

The key word to focus on in this statement alone is ‘grit.’ We will not be able to win on talent alone. He did not say we are never going to win a game.

If this were the case we may as well all toss in the towel and never look back. The conversation was started with the obvious intention to figure out what we need to do to take games from teams who physically outmatch us, because it is possible.

The trick is to accept that it is not possible to win if we continue on the same path, while keeping faith that if we commit to making change, we can and will win.

The brutal truth is that we are outmatched on paper.

B1G ten volleyball teams are built to be larger than life girls who are great jumpers, with powerful swings, and heavy serves. Winning teams in the B1G ten get the top physical recruits in the nation. We don’t happen to be that team. We’re not going to magically jump touch a foot higher than we do now to match the teams we are playing against.

None of us are going to grow five inches either. These are all things we know to be true. But we went neck and neck with a lot of these teams, falling short time and time again by tiny margins. So what tips the scale in our favor? Every uphill battle to ever exist has been won at the fighting fists of people who not only possess but understand and live their lives through one principle; grit.

Grit calls for a steel backbone and an unwavering and unafraid resolve driven by passion and purpose.

For the uphill battle winners, the saying, “Success comes to those who wait.” is a load of crap. They live their lives knowing that the hill is conquered by those who outwork yesterday’s best today. They continue to strive for this day after day. Yet through this grueling and time consuming process they still possess a level of passion to warrant patience while climbing. Patience is essential for the climb; waiting is not. The reality of the situation is we can no longer wait and stare up in awe from the bottom of the hill at teams who have reached the top. We need a direction to go, preferably up.

In the book Good to Great, by Jim Collins, to become a great team, the right people have to be “on the bus.” I believe the right people are. We’ve done the grueling practices, and long days in the gym, exhausting traveling weekends, staying up until the early hours of the morning in the hotel lobby finishing schoolwork.

However, so have the teams we compete against. Beyond this I am confident the right people are on our bus because above all else, those of us who remain have chosen to stay on board. Our past competition season was the ultimate test. The players struggled, the coaches struggled, some people left the bus, and others were kicked off.

What we are left with is a bus at a stand still, full of people that have chosen not to get off despite these struggles.

For that reason alone the remaining members of this team possess the grit and faith that we need to win. The piece of the puzzle we were missing is now staring us in the face. We will not win on talent alone. Confronted with this truth, we keep the faith that we will win, go back to the drawing board, and figure out how to begin the climb. The only direction left to go is up.