Family

I used to believe that I belonged to myself.

Life is stupid. You wake up in the middle of the night thinking that no one loves you – no one will ever love you. What you do in this situation, is make sure you have someone that will tell you that they love you. Because you always, always have those people. You just have to find them.

Three years after I came into the big bad world, my sister was born, and we did well, my parents and my sister and I. We built our own little bubble, and lived happily inside.

I stepped out a lot. I broke free of the bubble countless times, when I was angry, or frustrated… but I always came back. I didn’t really know why I came back. I didn’t really know why I’d be promising myself never to talk to my parents or sister again, and then two hours later we’d be sitting together laughing.

The world isn’t an illusion, it’s a reality, and you will be waking up to it every day. Stuff happens, things break, and you fight with the ones you love more times than you can count. The very definition of family is overcoming that.

And I guess we all came back to bubble. Because failure in life is inevitable – honestly, you can’t possibly have lived unless you have tasted failure. And when that happens, that bubble is what we call home.

And we all get lost. Life is a force beyond your control – until you learn how to control it. So do that. Learn how to take control. Don’t step out of your bubble, ever, because that is when you start to lose people. Smile, even when you don’t feel like it. Accept your world the way it is, and if not, work to make it better. Most importantly, have the strength to believe in your family.

Because being part of a family means that you are part of something wonderful. It means you will love and be loved for the rest of your life, no matter what.

Life is, in fact, a battle, and you need warriors for a war. And those people, the people that fight your battles with you, are the people that become your family, whether by blood or not. Because family isn’t always bound by appearances, or pieces of paper, or even genes. Family is loving those who love you. Family is what makes up the fragments of your heart. It’s not something that belongs to the past, but is very much part of your future.

As for belonging to myself, as time wore on, I realized, that no, I belong to the people that I love. For family is not who our DNA tells us we belong to. Family is whom we chose to belong to.

The essence of family is that we don’t seek perfection in those that are our family. We seek love – and even through the worst times, that is something that is always there.

-A Girl In This World

Success

Success is not something you only achieve once, by beating someone in some sort of race. Success is an ongoing process. It happens every single day, and if you don’t work for it, you fail at it.

Most of all, despite what some people say, success is not the key to happiness. Rather, happiness is the key to success.

To be successful, trust yourself. Ignore the haters. Don’t be afraid to fail, because I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – failure is the foundation of learning. Work for what you want, and give things back to people, because while giving isn’t so great all the time; taking doesn’t get you muchwhere either.

I don’t know. I can’t tell you what to do to be successful. See, our definitions of success vary so much.

Some of us in this room right now want to be elected as president, or become famous singers and actors like Taylor Swift and Christina Perri, Jennifer Lawrence and Angelina Jolie, or be doctors and lawyers and everything in between. Others want to make big money and hold that position through life. Some of us just want to get straight A’s, even B’s, and graduate!

And maybe there are people here who’s idea of success has been laid out for them already by their parents. But the thing is, success is yours, and unfortunately, that’s why I can’t tell you so much on how to achieve it. Not your mother’s, or father’s, or sister’s, or brother’s, or teacher’s, or friend’s, or dog’s, no, your success is yours. Make it your own. That’s the one thing I can tell you, even if there’s not much else I have to say… you know why?

Too many people have too specific definitions of success. But success isn’t measured by how many trophies you have. You don’t measure how much you’ve grown since a certain point in time by inches, or how much you weigh, or even results on a test.

Because at the end of the day, success isn’t about winning. It’s about making mistakes, but recovering from them – it’s about learning from your bad experiences and doing better.

Success is not about accumulating enough money to buy anything to want for the rest of your life. Success is the point where you’re content in life – with what you have, because you have worked for it. And you continue to work for that content feeling, because honestly, isn’t that what success is? The point where you’re content in life. Nothing more, nothing less. How wonderful.

Change - What If?

To dream is to pose a question. To dream, to believe, to achieve, is to hope beyond hope. To dream, is to ask yourself - What If?

The world is a library. Each of us has a story in the library of the world. Each of us has our own book, that is being written from the second we come out into the world, to the day we leave. These stories are one. You only get one shot at life, unless you're Gandalf. Even if there is an afterlife. You can only like one life in one lifetime - no more, and certainly no less. Life is for living. To live this life out to the fullest is to to pose questions - see the world from every angle there is. To live is to dream about why you want, and reach out to it. To live, is to ask those questions, and demand answers to them. To live, is to live to the FULLEST.

So welcome change. Meet new people. Do different things. Change... What a beautiful concept. It's what makes the world go round. Do not be satisfied with half a life. If you want answers, find them. Never make space for regret. Always remember to make sure you never have ANY regret in your life.

Ask yourself - What If? Life is full of What Ifs. Make up your own. A What If goes through someone's head every time they make a choice. Ask yourself - What If? Visualise. Realise. Individualise. Make your choice your own. See your own future with your own questions - with your own eyes. What If? What is the best path? What If you do this in comparison to that? Make an informed choice. Take your time, and then take the plunge into change, and do it bravely - ready, and genuinely excited.

Your story does not write itself. The Library of Life has many authors - and you are always your own.

So ask the question. What If?

Go for what you want. Be, and do, what you want. Your choices become you, every second that you make them. Remember that.