My younger, daughter Gia, has a petite face with small features .

As a baby and growing up, I’ve always had people – friends, family and strangers, commenting about her.

But only ever with one word – “Cute”
“She is SO cute!”

And I’ve made a point of never describing her as this from my own mouth. Until the other morning.

This brief glimpse in time, a snapshot in my day, has had me questioning themes I’ve heard – not for the first time.

How often do we have these amazing dreams as children, that are then gradually bred out of us from society?

We are constantly told we are this, or we are that. That we SHOULD do this, or we SHOULD do that.

As women, our whole lives start to get dictated to by well-meaning others.

To ensure we are good daughters. Good girlfriends. Good friends. Good colleagues. Good wives. Good mothers.

How many of us end up as people pleasers by nature then? Having heard our whole lives that to be ‘good’ we need to look after other people.

Putting our jobs, our men, our friends, our family before (and often at the expense) of our own hopes, dreams and goals?

It’s like we are slowly walking down a hill, that the gradient of is so tiny at first, that we hardly notice it’s even heading down.

But one day, we look up and all those things, all those desires that we put aside for something else that seemed more important in the moment, are  now at the top of a massive mountain.

We’ve been so busy being so good to everyone else, we forgot to be good to ourselves.

And it’s not that we no longer want those things. When  we stop, press pause and remember our childhood passions, we wish we COULD have our dream!

But the climb back up seems so long. So hard. We might trip and fall and come part way back down. Or worse, fall even further down the mountain than we were when we started.

We also wonder to ourselves, “What if I fail to reach the top?’ ‘What if when I get to the top, those desires and dreams aren’t what I thought they would be?’

Maybe it would be safer to stay at the bottom of our mountain, where it’s now known.

Fear keeps us locked in place.

Those hopes and dreams at the top of the mountain may change as you being to climb. They may well not be what we expected them to be when we reach them.

But if we don’t even try, how will we ever know?

Deep within, innately we know that whatever may lie at the top, it will end up to be our true self.
Ready and waiting.

That we can have ANYTHING we want, if we can start to put ourselves up the priority list again.

We believe that we want to lose our excess weight to look good and fit our clothes comfortably again.

We believe that we want to eat healthy to feel good.

We believe that we want to exercise to stay strong and mobile.

We believe that we want more energy to be able to get more done in the day in with ease.

But really, we NEED those things to give us the confidence, time and drive to reach our dreams and become the woman we know we were put on this planet to be.

We need to choose to put our hiking boots on. Lace them up tight. Put one foot in front of the other. Grab onto any support on the journey upwards that we can. Face that fear.

We will climb like we’ve never climbed before!

We will reach the top of that mountain!

We will stand as proud and as sure as our inner 5 year old!

And we will BE that woman who had all those dreams to dance, run a marathon, sing, paint, give to charity, start a business, be the best Mum, travel the world, become a photographer, become a yogi and ultimately – the BEST bloody version of ourselves that we knew we were all along!

Now is the time to start to channel the confidence of our inner 5 year old.
Our belief that anything is possible in the world for us.

Because I can tell you, it really is.

You just need to believe in yourself…