Sometimes, when all seems lost, all we can do is hope.
Hope that we’re just going through a rough patch right now, and that it’ll be over soon.
Hope that we have all the answers inside ourselves – and don’t need anything to be given to us by anyone else.
Hope that we do have what it takes, that we do have a vision that’s worth making real in this world, that we are worthy of success.
Hope that the risks we’re taking won’t hurt us, and if they do, all we can do is hope that we’ll be able to get up, dust ourselves off, and live to take more risks, to gamble even more on ourselves.
You Have Every Reason to Believe In Yourself
We all go through rough patches of self-doubt – times when the very life seems to be sucked out of your limbs and you’re left wondering, “What am I supposed to be doing with myself – and how can I rid myself of this awful, gnawing feeling of anxiety?”
Self-doubt is crippling – I’ve experienced it often, even though I’m usually very, very sure of myself. Normally, I’m a great decision-maker. But sometimes, no matter how strong we are, we can be brought to our knees… By ourselves. By our own fears.
Actually, to admit it: right now, I’m going through a stage of ultimate self-doubt. Contributing factors: my hockey team lost in the district final game for the third year in a row, and it’s my senior year. I’ve had three chances in my high school career to win it all, and I lost all three of them. That’s depressing – and it makes me think: am I not deserving of winning? Will I ever be able to claim victory? Will I ever experience true success?
Three days later, last night [at the time of writing] I got a rejection letter from one of my top-choice schools. The rejection didn’t sting as much as losing in hockey did, but it still contributed to the sense of self-doubt that I’m feeling.
Right now – I don’t know what I’m doing with myself and my future. I know I’m going to be blogging here for a while – as long as my creativity lets me and I have useful lessons to teach you, reader – but as far as my real future, like what I’m going to be doing for a job (I think I want to be an entrepreneur, but, again, my fear is staring back at me and is saying that I won’t be any good at it, because I “lack ideas”. See how absurd fear is?), or even more pertinent questions like where I’m going to go to school next year, are totally unknown.
Because I don’t know them, I don’t know what to do with myself in the meantime.
I’ve quickly found out in the past few days that endless consumption is not going to save me. Reading books en masse is not a good strategy to dig myself out of my rut. It’s running away from the problem.
And I’m paralyzed. By fear. By The Resistance. By the idea that every moment I spend right now has absolutely no weight – I feel like it’s meaningless. Or, at least, that’s what the fear is telling me. My fear’s also telling me that my plans to start a new website (about my own personal life and my personal projects), self-publish the novel I wrote over the summer on the Web, and write an ebook (for this site) are all bad ideas. My fear thinks they’ll all end in failure.
You know what I say to that?
We’ll see.
Right now, I feel like everything is turning itself around – even as I write this post. That’s the power of creation – and why I know that the solution is to start working on those crazy projects of mine immediately.
Creation proves that I am worth something, that my mind is productive, that I can make change in this world. It’s proof that I am not insignificant. Being able to create is proof that yes – I can make something of myself, if I allow myself to dream big and work my hardest to make them a reality.
You can create too. You’re not a blogger like me, but you do something as a form of art, something you can create (or work at creating) each and every day. Even when everything else seems to be in doubt, return to your work, my friends. Return to your creative side, and see what you can make.
What you make is an expression of your soul – and is proof that you can have hope, proof that you have every reason to believe in yourself.
True about it Brett, most people having doubt and questions to themselves down to journey to success in life, and of course, it including myself.
Keep finding something to prove that I can reach more, I can achieve more, I can do it, from failures, and from a little success inside the failures, from the improving and growth I experience on myself, it keep pushing me to keep moving.
There’re lots of past failures that push me up till today, the desperate, lost hope, all target,dreams yet to achieve even the timeline set by myself had reached.
Motivation and inspiration down the road is a need, whether it’s form deep inside ourself, or outer energy field, including learning other people’s success + failures stories, learn from those more successful than us, keep finding more values from emptiness, keep improving.
There’ll definitely ups and downs in this journey, so I train myself to emjoy every single moment, including the down parts; eventually the rainbow will appears after the rain. =D
Yes.
I agree with everything you wrote Jia! Thank you so much for sharing
Brett, this is beautifully written and really touched me. I understand what it feels like to be in a fluctuating state, not really committing to anything and doubting your competence in everything. I want to just encourage you to keep going, keep searching, and have FAITH, that the right answers will present themselves. I’m not religious is any traditional way, but I truly believe hope and faith, work best when partnered together.
Regards
Stacey
Thank you so much for your kind words, Stacey
I’m glad I could help you out 
Seeing your comment made me smile!
I’ve been in a similar situation except with basketball instead of hockey. We went pretty far in the state tournament 3 years in a row, and lost. We didn’t even make it to the tournament at all my senior year, which hurt the worst of all.
But I learned to move on, the pain goes away with time. Playing sports is amazingly fun and so is winning, but you soon learn there’s other things in life to focus on.
I enjoyed the article Brett, thanks! Fear comes and goes, the key is to just push through it and face it. Don’t tell yourself you WANT to be an entrepreneur, because you already ARE one.
Sean,
Absolutely. Everything passes eventually, and things wax and wane in their importance… And for me, I’m not a true entrepreneur until I start my own business
Hope sounds a little tentative to me and doesn’t inspire positive emotions. For me, I’m not sure of the outcome of many of my undertakings but I do I will always land on my feet and live to battle another day. That’s a very comforting perspective for me. I guess its a confidence, self esteem thing. Wish you the best.
Riley
Riley,
My hope really just is the confidence in myself that, no matter what happens, I’ll end up on my feet. Keeping that “hope” and belief in myself prevents me from thinking that the worst case scenario – being in a situation that permanently scars me – will actually occur.
Thanks for the thoughtful comment!
The part where you said that by reading more books is actually just ‘running away’, and also in your last paragraph that it is often by the act of Creation (& Expressing yourself) that you can find the needed inspiration, truly really speaks to me, Brett.
Sure, reality might be, and even IS harsh, often times.
We could never know what the *future* may bring/come into us.
We’re mere humans with many physical limitations, after all.
But lo and behold, if you look through human’s history,
it’s actually those who still keep believing and have faith in themselves and their dreams, are the ones who can continue achieving, and also creating great things that even marked down the history of mankind.
If humans easily give up to the current “Reality”,
then there would never be the invention of airplanes,
then there would never be first man landing on the Moon.
Which reminds me of these two great quotes I’d like to share here,
that time & time again never fail to burn my ‘dreamer’ spirit back shining brightly to never dim away:
“History, though, shows us that the people who end up changing the world—the great political, scientific, social, technological, artistic, even sports revolutionaries—are always nuts, until they’re right, and then they’re geniuses.” – John Eliot
“Here’s to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes…the ones who see things differently — they’re not fond of rules…You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can’t do is ignore them because they change things…they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do.” – Steve Jobs
And of course, from John Lennon’s greatest song, we may even take comfort that we ‘dreamers’ are NOT alone.
“You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one” – John Lennon (Imagine)
Steve Jobs quote = money. I can’t wait to shatter the status quo in my own way in due time… It’s an ambitious goal, but hey – I know I can do it. And maybe it won’t be something I invent but in the way I live my life that I’ll change everything.
As always, Niki, thank you so much for your thoughtful comments! I love love love to read them!
Also Brett, what you write somehow reminds me a lot of this article,
it has to do with the “Enneagram Type” of Personality inventory,
but maybe it could also strongly apply to your points:
http://www.enneagraminstitute.com/personalgrowth.asp
Brett, This too shall pass. Keep telling yourself that and don’t over indulge in your negative thoughts and emotions.
Oh yes, fear is really absurd, especially fear of change or a big step, like in my situation about choosing the right university, i was thinking between english and psychology, but in the end when we pick one, we should believe in it and in ourselves.
Haha, thank you for the motivation im off writing an article immediately, after a big pause.
Hi Brett,
I dont remember how I found your website, but it has been a recent discovery and I would like to say how I feel SO GRATEFUL that you created it..it is amazing, inspiring, motivating, gives hope, etc… I have no doubt that you are awesome and how you are ahead of the curve (not that we should compare ourselves with other ppl) but I know that even at a young age, you are able to write and think profound things! So thank you sooo much!!!
I dont know if you know a lot about Mark Cuban, he has a blog called maverick and I think he is an inspiration bc if you read his story and his life, you will be impressed how someone like him became a millionaire..to inspire you in those moments of self doubt and fear, i would like to share some of the posts in which he explains how his life seemed like a failure in the past and how he never imagined that he would become so successful as he is today!
http://blogmaverick.com/?s=success+%26+motivation
http://blogmaverick.com/2004/04/23/success-and-motivation-part-1/ (i believe there are 4 parts of this post and you should read it!)
This will definetely give you hope!!!
love and light!
Debbie
Hey Brett, very supportive, especially the last part. Being true to yourself by engaging in ‘work’ or things which you enjoy is a sure way to re-spark understanding, and remind yourself that all is good
Take care
Dom
Thanks, Dom
Getting back to working is awesome – it’s so reinvigorating for me.
Hope all is well on your end too
I like this article, Brett. It’s really authentic. You’re a senior in high school?? I had no idea. This is quite some wisdom you have for such a young age! (I’m not much older..!)
This reminds me of a book I thumbed through the other day. It was called “Don’t sweat the small stuff (and it’s all small stuff)”.
I used to worry a lot about the future, but I’ve found that the more I live in the moment, the more my intuition guides me to where I need to go. Perhaps living more in the moment might help?
Hey Fred,
Yep, I’m a senior in high school.
Living in the present helps, but, I’ll admit – over the past few weeks, I’ve been stuck in the ‘future’ or the ‘past’, agonizing over my college acceptances. It’s difficult to stay in the present when something’s coming so soon that will change your life forever.
How’d I survive with the anxiety? I did things that required my attention in the present so I could get into a flow state and avoid thinking about decisions. Eventually, the time passed, and here I am, into an amazing school. My hope was justified
I just got rejected from one of my top schools too, and it stung me so bad. So thank you for writing this. You seem really intelligent and talented, so it gives me comfort that even someone like you got rejected.
Thanks, CG
I got into one of the top schools in the country after this post when up, so it’s all good now 
I hope you experienced the same!
Your blogs are appreciable. We learn a lot reading them. In today’s world, they are like fresh breeze of air.
I subscribed to your blog a while ago and have been getting updates, but somehow I stopped getting new posts about two weeks ago…I used another email to subscribed and still not getting anything….I really enjoyed reading your blog while in the subway, could you look into that please?
I love that when you start a project people will call you crazy!
and then when they see the progress and the finished articles, they change their views to what yours were in the beginning…
therefore,you and I can never fault a trier as they are being true to themselves and how can u fault that
A wise man once said:
Always hope for the best. Always be prepared for the worst.
Wow… are you really only a senior in high school? When I was reading your post I thought it was done by some old geezer (no offense) but really.. you sound very mature for your age and you’re not even in college! Your writing style I would thought of one written by a guru or “teacher” and you are a blessing to us all. Very very impressed. Keep it up!