If you’re reading this right now and things feel heavy, I want you to know I see you.

I know what it’s like to wake up and immediately feel that weight in your chest, the one that makes you wonder if your life is ever going to look different than it does right now.

I know what it’s like to scroll through other people’s lives and think “how did they figure it out when I’m still stuck here?” I know because I was there too, not that long ago.

The Night Shifts

Two years ago I was working night shifts at a hotel reception desk, and I need you to understand how surreal and terrifying that experience actually was.

I wasn’t just tired or stressed, I was genuinely scared. There was no security guard, just me sitting there alone in this quiet building in the middle of the night with my anxiety spiraling into full-blown paranoia.

Every sound made me jump. Every shadow felt like a threat. I’d watch the clock obsessively, counting down the hours until sunrise like it was some kind of salvation, and the worst part was knowing I’d have to do it all over again the next night, and the night after that. Sometimes 5 nights straight.

And it wasn’t just the night shifts. I was rotating between morning shifts, evening shifts, and those god-awful overnight hours, which meant my sleep schedule was completely destroyed and I felt like I was losing my mind most days.

I was living in a Nordic country where it’s dark and grey for eight months out of the year, if you’ve never experienced that, imagine waking up in the dark, going to work in the dark, and coming home in the dark for literally two-thirds of the year.

It does something to you. It makes everything feel heavier, harder, more hopeless.

And on top of all of that, I was living in a twenty-one square meter studio apartment in the countryside. Twenty-one square meters. That’s basically the size of a generous walk-in closet, except it had to function as my bedroom, living room, kitchen, and entire life. I could barely afford it.

I’d sit there after my shifts, exhausted and anxious, looking around at this tiny space that somehow felt even smaller because of how stuck I felt inside of it, and I’d think “this cannot be my life forever.”

I wasn’t being dramatic. I was genuinely terrified that this was it, that I’d wake up at 40 still doing this job, still living in this tiny apartment, still feeling this trapped and exhausted and scared.

And the worst part is that I didn’t even know what I wanted instead.

I just knew I couldn’t keep living like this.

What Kept Me Going

Here’s something I’ve never really talked about publicly: during those night shifts when my anxiety was at its worst and the hours felt endless, I started printing out pictures. Vision board pictures. Images of places I wanted to travel, lives I wanted to live, versions of myself I wanted to become.

I’d print them during my shift when nobody was around and I’d spread them out on the desk in front of me, and I’d just look at them. It sounds silly, maybe, but it helped.

It reminded me that the life I was living wasn’t the only life available to me.

Nobody tells you when you’re in the middle of feeling stuck that you’re probably closer to changing everything than you realize. I know that sounds like something you’d read on a motivational poster, and I know you’ve probably heard it before and thought “yeah, sure, but my situation is different.”

But I’m telling you this because it’s actually true, and I need you to believe me even if you can’t quite believe in yourself yet.

How Everything Changed

I didn’t have some magical moment of clarity where everything suddenly made sense.

There was no dramatic turning point where I woke up one day and had my whole life figured out. What happened was much messier and more human than that.

I got to a point where staying felt worse than the fear of leaving, so I quit. I didn’t have a plan B.

I just knew I couldn’t keep doing what I was doing, and I trusted that I’d figure the rest out as I went.

And for a while, nothing worked. I tried things and they flopped. I doubted myself constantly. I wondered if I’d made a massive mistake leaving a stable job to chase something I couldn’t even articulate properly.

There were days when I genuinely thought I’d ruined my life, days when I wanted to crawl back to that hotel desk and beg for my job back because at least it was familiar, at least I knew what to expect.

But I kept going anyway, not because I was brave or special or had some secret formula, but because I literally didn’t know what else to do.

And slowly, things started to change.

I started connecting with people through my writing. I started building something that felt like mine. I started waking up without that immediate sense of dread.

And now, less than two years later, I’m writing this from Bali. I work when I want, where I want. I built a business that actually feels good to run.

That terrified girl sitting alone at a hotel reception desk at three in the morning feels like someone I used to know but can barely recognize anymore.

I’m not telling you this to brag or to make you feel bad about where you are right now. I’m telling you this because I need you to understand that two years is not that long. Two years ago I was crying in a twenty-one square meter apartment wondering if my life would ever change, and now everything is different.

Not perfect asnI still have hard days, days where I doubt myself and wonder if I’m doing enough or being enough or building fast enough.

But even my hard days now are so much lighter than my normal days were back then.

What You Need to Hear Right Now

If you’re reading this on one of your hard days, I want you to really hear what I’m about to say.

You are not stuck forever, even though it feels that way right now.

I don’t care how long you’ve been in the same job, the same relationship, the same city, the same version of your life that doesn’t quite fit anymore. I don’t care if you’re 23 or 43 or 63.

Where you are right now is not permanent. It feels permanent because you’re living in it every single day, but it’s not. It’s just where you are right now, in this moment, in this chapter.

And chapters end. New ones begin. That’s how this works.

You don’t need to have everything figured out before you start changing things. I didn’t have a business plan when I quit my job. I didn’t know what I was building or how I was going to make it work.

I just knew I couldn’t stay where I was, and sometimes that’s enough. Sometimes “I can’t keep doing this” is exactly the clarity you need to take the first step toward something different.

You don’t need to see the whole path. You just need to see the next step, and then the step after that, and then the one after that. That’s how you build a life that actually feels like yours.

And here’s the thing that nobody talks about, it probably won’t take as long as you think.

We have this idea in our heads that changing our lives is this massive, years-long endeavor that requires perfect timing and ideal circumstances and a level of certainty we’ll never actually have.

But the truth is that things can change faster than you expect once you stop waiting for permission and just start. Two years. That’s how long it took for my entire life to look completely different. Not ten years, not “someday when the stars align,” just two years of trying and failing and adjusting and trying again.

You have time. You have so much more time than you think you do.

And you’re allowed to want more than what you have right now. You’re allowed to want more freedom, more peace, more mornings where you don’t immediately feel that weight in your chest. You’re allowed to want a life that doesn’t exhaust you, work that doesn’t drain you, days that feel lighter and easier and more like yours.

Wanting more doesn’t make you ungrateful or selfish or unrealistic. It makes you human. It means you know, somewhere deep down, that there’s another version of your life waiting for you, and you’re brave enough to admit that you want it.

Something You Can Do Right Now

If you’re feeling stuck or lost or like you don’t even know where to start, I want you to do something for me. Actually, do it for yourself. Go create a vision board. Not tomorrow, not next week, not when you have more time or feel more motivated. Right now. Today.

I know it might sound too simple or too “woo-woo” or like something that won’t actually make a difference, but I’m telling you from experience that it does. When I was sitting at that hotel desk in the middle of the night feeling terrified and stuck, those printed pictures I’d spread out in front of me were the only thing reminding me that another life was possible.

They kept me going when everything else felt hopeless.

So download the vision board template I gave you in your Christmas card. Pick the design that speaks to you. Go to Pinterest or save photos from anywhere that represent the life you actually want to be living, not the life you think you should want, not the life that looks good to other people, but the one that makes your heart beat a little faster when you imagine it. Your dream home. The places you want to travel. The version of yourself you’re becoming. The freedom you’re building toward. Whatever lights you up, put it on that board.

And then look at it. Every single day. Put it next to your bed so you see it first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Make it your phone wallpaper. Print it out and stick it on your wall. Let it become part of your daily life, a constant reminder that the person you’re becoming and the life you’re building are already real, they’re just not here yet.

Because the truth is that, there is nothing you cannot achieve. I don’t care how impossible it seems right now or how far away your dreams feel. That girl working night shifts in a tiny apartment never thought she’d be here either, but she kept looking at those pictures and believing that another version of her life was possible, and eventually it was.

Your turn.

Don’t wait. Create your vision board today. Not because it’s magic, but because you deserve to spend time imagining a life you actually want to live.

And because seeing it every day will change something in you, slowly, until one day you look around and realize you’re actually living it.

So come back to this letter whenever you need it. Bookmark it, save the link, read it on the days when you forget that change is possible. Read it when you’re doubting yourself, when you’re scared, when you’re tired of trying and nothing seems to be working yet.

Come back to it and remember that the girl who wrote this was exactly where you are now, feeling exactly what you’re feeling, and she made it out. You will too. I believe that with my whole heart, even if you can’t quite believe it yet yourself.