Recently, a few things have happened that have made me realise things I suppose I already knew. But somehow, I’m seeing them more clearly now.

People can tell you the same clichés over and over again. Trust yourself. Stop worrying about what other people think. Surround yourself with good people. The hardest paths often lead to the best places. You can understand all of that intellectually, but until you begin to notice it in your own life, until you actually experience it, I don’t think it truly hits home.

I think one of the gifts of getting into your forties is that you gradually start to care less about what other people think. And for me, it really has been gradual. Painfully gradual at times. I’m not suddenly walking around completely free from self-doubt or immune to other people’s opinions. But I am beginning to understand just how important it is to listen to yourself because, if you don’t, you can so easily end up living a life shaped by everyone else.

By what society tells you success should look like. By what your friends are doing. By the milestones you’re apparently supposed to reach. Buy the bigger house. Earn more money. Keep climbing. Get promoted. Build the perfect career. Send your children to the “right” schools. Drive a better car. Go on impressive holidays. Look successful, even if none of it is making you particularly happy.

Perhaps you’ve felt it too. That pressure to keep moving towards a life you’re not even sure you want, simply because it looks like the life you’re supposed to have.

But I’m also realising that listening to yourself doesn’t always mean choosing the quieter or easier path. Sometimes it means admitting that you want more, even when going after it feels frightening, exhausting and uncertain.

Recently, I caught myself thinking: I could just stop doing all of this. I could stop trying to grow the business, stop pushing myself and simply focus on looking after my existing clients. I’d probably have less stress, more money in the short term to support my family, and more time and freedom. And my God, that is tempting, especially right now.

But then I stop and ask myself whether that is what I really want. And it isn’t. I know that, in the long run, I would be disappointed with myself. Not because there is anything wrong with choosing a quieter or easier life, but because I would know that I hadn’t even tried to create the life I can see in my head, or make the difference that I know would leave me feeling more fulfilled.

I wouldn’t have pushed myself or discovered what I was capable of. I wouldn’t have grown. I would have stepped away because I was overwhelmed and tired, not because it was genuinely the right decision for me.

There is a difference between something being difficult and something being wrong for you. I think we sometimes confuse the two. When something feels hard, uncertain or frightening, it’s easy to assume that we shouldn’t be doing it. We start looking for reasons to stop. We tell ourselves that staying where we are would be more sensible. Safer. Simpler.

And sometimes it might be. But that doesn’t necessarily make it right for us. Thinking can get in the way of knowing. We can analyse something so much that we lose touch with what we knew before all the noise began. The fear, the imagined outcomes, the opinions of other people and the hundred perfectly sensible reasons not to change anything can become so loud that we can no longer hear ourselves.

Deep down, I think I already know what I want to do. But then my thoughts start trying to talk me out of it because staying where I am would be easier, safer and more familiar. I could make everything simpler. But that's fear talking. It isn’t necessarily what I truly want.

Then something happens that brings the reason back into focus and gives me that push again. Last week, someone told me about the toxic culture they were working in and the way certain people were being treated. And I just thought: how is this allowed to carry on as though it’s normal? How can people behave like this without recognising the effect it has on everyone around them?

After that conversation, I just thought: this really is happening all the time. And it genuinely bothers me, probably because of my experience at the last place I worked and because I’ve seen the effect a toxic environment can have on everything and everyone around it. And it creates a pretty strong feeling in me, one that I can use as fuel to try to build something different.

I guess sometimes we need those reminders. Something that cuts through all the overthinking and brings us back to why we wanted to do something in the first place. Because when you reconnect with something you feel deeply about, the fear may not disappear, but it becomes a little quieter.

I still don’t have things worked out. I still question myself. I still get overwhelmed and feel tempted to choose what is easier rather than what I truly want. But perhaps courage isn’t feeling completely certain. Perhaps it's knowing that something matters enough to try, even when you can’t guarantee how it will turn out.

You don’t have to keep pursuing something simply because you started it. You’re allowed to change your mind, choose a quieter life or decide that something no longer feels right. But I think we owe it to ourselves to be honest about why we are walking away. Is it because this life genuinely isn’t right for you? Or is it because the life you really want is asking you to be braver than you feel right now?

Only you can answer that. But to hear the answer, you may need to become quiet enough to recognise the difference between what you truly want and what fear is telling you to choose. Because difficult doesn’t always mean wrong.

Sometimes difficult means you’re growing. Sometimes it means you’re challenging everything that has kept you safe and familiar. And sometimes it means you’re finally moving towards the life you can see in your head. 🩷