To the Ambitious Daughter Who Tried To Do It All

On chasing big dreams—and learning to trust God with the pace.

To the ambitious, high-achieving, eldest daughter…

I see you.

You entered this world shy and desperate to be seen.

You hid behind your insecurities and longed to belong.

Yet you always stood out.

Your beautiful, pale skin shone like a light amongst the others and you always struggled to “fit in”.

You moved countries and had to adjust to a whole different world that you were supposed to call your home, but couldn’t.

You felt misunderstood and set aside. You desperately wanted to speak the “lingo” yet no matter how hard you tried, you still felt left out. You tried to be the best at everything. But always ended up pretty average. You compared yourself to others and tried to be someone else you’re not. You second guessed yourself.

Not long after, you were uprooted again. Not by choice but because your family saw a better way. They pioneered a different way. They saw opportunity. And you were disappointed but then you accepted it. You saw the vision and so you trusted them and you followed.

You were lonely.

So many nights went by where you questioned your existence. Your relationship to God. You wondered, “Why God? Why does nobody understand me? Why are there so many cliques? Why can’t people just see me for who I am? Why do they have to label me as the ‘international kid’? Why do I always have to stand out and work so hard to be a part of something? Where are you God? Do you even hear me?”

The world went into lockdown and that was the year you were supposed to “LIVE” your life. The year of fun, adventure, end of high school parties. Instead, you were left with Netflix, Youtube, self-help books and a journal… You were supposed to travel the world. Live your life to the fullest! You couldn’t understand why everything had to be so hard or unreachable for you.

Oh my dear, you had no idea what lay ahead of you…

All those nights crying, wondering, wishing the time away – the Lord was preparing you.

“For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a hope and a future.”
Jeremiah 29:11 NIV

You called a friend on a whim and booked your first solo flight to the Western edge of Europe. You had no plan but to spend 3 months there “seeing” what it was like… you dreamt of living in your own European room with a flexible work schedule and working remotely in coffee shops. You dreamt of walking the streets in your vans and cute handbag talking to a friend over the phone on your way to a ‘client meeting’.

Little did you know that less than a year later, that journey would begin. And that you would be living the very dream you so dismissed as nearly impossible. And not in the way you thought, but in exactly the way that God had designed and planned years before you were even a thought or even before you could fathom.

“For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.”
Psalm 139:13-14 NIV

So you went. In faith.

You took the leap and moved to Europe. You spent months hopping from apartment to apartment until you finally found your room, one you could call your little sanctuary.

You went through more tearful nights, fearing the unknown, judging yourself for taking the path less traveled.

Comparing yourself to others years ahead of you. Trying to make sense of who you are and where you’re going. You hustled, oh my dear, you hustled. You made a dent in the heart of the city, you invested into relationships and then you came crashing down.

Not because you weren’t doing enough, but because you were trying to do it all on your own…

You realised you needed support.

You took another step of faith. It was hard. Oh so hard, but you made it through. You received the love and support of friends and family and you invested in mentorship.

You made necessary endings.

“Getting to the next level always requires ending something, leaving it behind, and moving on. Growth itself demands that we move on. Without the ability to end things, people stay stuck, never becoming who they are meant to be, never accomplishing all that their talents and abilities should afford them.”
― Henry Cloud, Necessary Endings: The Employees, Businesses, and Relationships That All of Us Have to Give Up in Order to Move Forward

You were confronted.

A mirror was held up and you realised how much work you had to do, but you stuck it through. You were willing to face it, to own it and to do something about it.

You made the most wonderful friends.

You put yourself in uncomfortable situations to grow. You fell down a couple of times and got back up. You made offers. You got blindsided. You kept showing up. Imperfectly and completely whole. You took chances. You put yourself out there. You made mistakes. But most importantly, you had fun and you always prioritised connection.

You trusted your ability to move forward.

Not because you were so amazing but because of all the hardships you faced, all the setbacks you experienced, all the tears you cried, and all the joyous breakthroughs you were gifted with. Those were all God creating opportunities for you to grow in trusting Him. In surrendering and handing the pen back over to Him.

“But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him.
They will be like a tree planted by the water
that sends out its roots by the stream.
It does not fear when heat comes;
its leaves are always green.
It has no worries in a year of drought
and never fails to bear fruit.”
Jeremiah 17:7-8 NIV

And here we are at the present.

In case you haven’t realised… this is my story. A brief summary of my life up until this point. Imperfect. Messy. And exactly where I need to be.

This is not an attempt to show you how cool I am, it’s to demonstrate how faithful God is. I still struggle to fit in sometimes, I still second guess myself and I am not always sure of what I’m doing but what I do know is that I’m learning to trust God, trust His timing and let go of my need to always know what’s to come.

I am learning to slow down.

To embrace the freedom that I often easily take for granted. To embrace the loneliness that comes with living a life of radical responsibility and essentially the road less travelled.

I trust someone out there reading this feels a similar way and if that’s the case I hope that it will encourage someone out there to keep running the good race and to keep showing up.

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith."
Hebrews 12:1-2 NIV

You’ve got this. It’s not easy – but if it was – then we wouldn’t be doing it right? We need a good challenge. And how privileged we are to have God run the race with us.

Keep showing up, my friend. If I can do it, so can you. <3