As we reach for bigger and bigger things in ours lives, fears are guaranteed to come up.

At this crucial point, you can either give up or go forward. But I know that if you're reading this, you're the type who WANTS to go forward so I wanted to share some special tips today.

The Terror Barrier is this concept that when you are trying to change your life, there is a mental barrier to you must break through. You have to completely change the way you think about your life and what is possible. You have to break a LOT of old habits and unconscious ways of thinking. When you first try to do this, you subconscious mind FREAKS out. It will make you worry and convince you to that it's too painful, not gonna work, etc. 

Let me explain: (I prefer to be transparent. A lot of people make it look like success comes to me easy, but I always find inspiration from learning the behind-the-scenes of people's lives, so here we go!)

Young people are not meant to be sitting in cubicles. We're meant to out THERE, making an impact, energized by our passions and inspiring others.  We're meant to be travelling to all corners of the world and collaborating with like-minded  young leaders.  What's stopping you from being free?

When I was in university, I told myself  telling myself countless times, I can’t wait till I’m out of here! Then I can devote ALL my time to growing this blog!  Of course, now that I’m done uni, I realize that it’s not that simple.  It’s been hard to manage my schedule and learn to prioritize while I am creating a never-ending list of things to do.  

For the last several weeks, I couldn’t seem to get much done, no matter how hard I beat my keyboard.  I tried different time management tactics - Pomodoro, scheduling software, changing my environment - but nothing stuck. 

Even with calming meditation music on, I couldn’t focus.  I would start one thing and get sidetracked again and again, until next thing you know, I go from writing a blog to editing my LinkedIn Profile to cutting the grass!

After several weeks of spiralling in and out, I’ve finally got some answers.  

I just got home from a week of famjams at the cottage.  In between some good ol' sibling bickering, swimming in the lake and gorging myself on s'mores, I got a reminder to practice what I preach.

On our way out of the Sunday morning chapel, a guy comes to chat with the one Asian family.  Turns out he works for a nonprofit organization that runs a massive humanitarian ocean cruise liner.  People stay on it for 2 years as volunteers, traveling the world and helping out in every capacity imaginable.  I was hooked.  I want to do that. 

I'm conflicted. My problem is that I'm trying to create my own dream career and live my passionate life while telling you how to live yours.  

So I'm making a declaration today that I will not try to tell you how to live your life.  I'll just tell you what's working for me.  (Honestly, this is what I've been doing all along, but I feel better making it clear to you :) I only ever share things that have personally worked for me.)

Here goes: I have seriously down days.  At various points in my life I thought I must have bipolar disorder, PMDD (aka. severe PMS), SAD ( aka. severe winter blues) or depression.

In my efforts to alleviate my moodiness, I went on birth control pills, cleaned up my diet, became vegetarian and even escaped last winter by jetting off to Singapore. Some things worked, but nothing for very long. 

Now I just face it, the ups and downs are part of the human condition. (Not to mention, starting a business makes highs higher and the lows lower.)  The point of life though is to ride the waves, not to numb it all out. 

What's your dream career?  Not the one you absorbed from professors, guidance counsellors, colleagues or parents. 

What's yours? 

I can't be "successful" until I find a world-class mentor.  She (or he) will be the CEO of a Fortune 500 company and she'll catapult me to the stratosphere with her influential contacts and sage advice.

 Then, I can't fail.  I just need a mentor.

For years, this is what I thought.

Everything takes time.  Lots of time. More than I know how to
fathom at my age.

I'm 23.  When I read about the careers of people who are doing what
I would love to do one day, I can feel the whole ship sinking.

AAAH, there's so much to do. How am I supposed to do all of that?!
I don't know how to do 99% of the things they talk about and the 1%
things that I can do, I suck at.  

Have you ever struggled over how to spend your money most "wisely"?No matter how much you have, it never seems to be enough?

We rarely talk about the moolah - unless its to say that we don't
have enough of it - and yet it's not how much you have, but how you
think about it that matters.

Contrary to extremely popular belief, you don't need to worry about
money.

 You should be smart about your finances, but mulling over your
supposed lack of money is going to keep you from doing what you
were meant to do on this planet.

I want you to know that you can live so passionately that you
bounce out of bed at 5am excited to face the day.  It's not always
easy, pretty or uncaffeinated, but it's worth it. With your smarts,
our savvy strategy and good TPP company, you can be infinitely
wealthy, happy and fulfilled.

I'm not just saying it.  I've seen it happen again and again, and
it'll happen for us too.

My Insights: I’m tired of hear­ing about how Mil­len­ni­als/Gen Y, aka. WE, are lazy, nar­cis­sis­tic and apathetic.

So far, I’ve trav­elled to and worked in 17 coun­tries. I maxed out every oppor­tu­nity dur­ing my uni­ver­sity years to travel by work­ing, vol­un­teer­ing, intern­ing, research­ing, teach­ing and study­ing abroad.   I can say from first-hand expe­ri­ence that young peo­ple from North Amer­ica to Europe to Africa are Dig­i­tal Natives and Global Cit­i­zens who are work­ing to cre­ate a bet­ter world.