I woke up one morning last week with a purpose in my heart. Do you ever have that feeling? The one that feels like some of the thousands of tiny pieces you’ve been trying to fit together finally fell into place in your heart while you slept? It’s a weird one, for sure, but also… one of the coolest.

It was like all the sleepless nights I have spent trying to figure things out, all the working dreams I have had, and all of the things (big and small) that I have done and accomplished over the past several years FINALLY paid some dividends.

There was no real Aha! moment. Nothing that I woke up thinking was new. In fact, it was a bunch of thoughts I have all the time. Wishes I make regularly. Dreams I dream every day and night. So what was different?

This feeling.

I woke with a purpose in my heart to do the things I have been wishing and hoping and praying for my whole life. I felt filled with the knowledge that I was meant for it. I felt certain that it was one of the reasons I was put on this planet, that it was my way to make this world just a little bit better place to be, and that somehow, some way it was going to give me the life I’ve always felt I was meant to live. I felt confident that I was ready to move forward.

Sacrifices, compromises, and a lot of time and sweat equity will be required, but I’m finally ready to make them. I’m finally ready to pursue the things that have long felt like pipe dreams, wishful thinking, or a child’s naïveté.

And when those thoughts creeped in…Who am I to do this? What makes me qualified? What if I fail? What if I make a fool of myself? I answered myself.

Why not me? I have the education, the experience, and the interest.

What if I never try, never just do the darn thing, never put myself out there? I would regret it, and I would always wonder what might have been. I would never know how it might have changed the course of my life in ways big and small.

And honestly, I need to find a way to get back some of the qualities of the girl that I was growing up because that girl beat to her own drum and did not give a rip if it didn’t make sense to other people. It made sense to her; it made her happy; and that’s all that mattered.

Even if I fail or it doesn’t work out or it leads me down a path I never expected, at least I will know I did so by stepping out on a limb, hoping it can bear the weight of a lifetime of dreams. I will have done so trying. I will have learned and grown and ended up somewhere new. My Quality of Failure will get an A+. And that is a much better life than playing it safe and always wondering where it would have led me.

So what is the nagging idea that resurfaces in your sleep and in your daydreams? What distracts you when you’re busy doing all the things you “have to” do and makes you think, I could be doing so many other things, like ______ and is always the thing that fills in the blank.

If I were a betting woman, I’d bet something just popped into your head. What is it? Are you ready to listen to that voice yet? Are the pieces starting to fall into place in your heart?

Maybe they are, or maybe you still need some time to work your way around it before you can zero in on that thing in the center. This process is good and necessary. It leads to the Aha! moments that feel a lot more like the truth you’ve always known making itself perfect clear – in neon.