“You were brought into this world for a reason.”

“Do what you love, and you’ll never work another day in your life.”

If either of those lines pertains to you, then congrats. You’re one lucky SOB. One of the lucky ones in life who not only feel – but KNOW – they are doing exactly what they were meant to do in this life. As for me, I didn’t win that jackpot. And I know I’m not alone. So many of us are decades into our lives trying to figure out our place in the world. We’re good at our jobs. We like aspects of our jobs. But do we truly love our jobs? It makes me think of that movie “Julie & Julia” when Julia Child (Meryl Streep) writes to her friend that she’s so excited to start the day that she practically leaps out of bed when her alarm goes off at 6:30am.

Pan to me at 6:30am and I’m either groggily trying to get through an at-home workout or I’m hiding under the covers as my cat Bella incessantly meows and pounces on my face to get up and feed her. What exactly will get me to spring out of bed the minute my eyes open on a weekday morning?

I’ve made a lot of career pivots throughout my life. Before adulthood, I was confident I would be a chef, a storm chaser, a botanist, a paleontologist or a writer. I explored all of these options, and ultimately, writing won out. I could have taken a different path at any time, and I have to remind myself … THERE’S STILL TIME!

There’s still time to score the ultimate prize – the career jackpot. To me, that means finding work that gives you financial AND emotional compensation. How do you know you’ve found it? For starters, you won’t stay up into the wee hours of the morning dreading to start the next work day, or downing a drink each night to decompress. I kid, I kid … sort of.

So what is it that you still want to do in life? If you could do anything, what would it be? The sky is truly the limit. We live in a time when you can create the career of your dreams. Hell, remember when there was no such thing as an Instagram influencer? And now people have made 6-figure and 7-figure careers from a social media platform that didn’t even exist 10 years ago.

Which makes me ask. What are you waiting for? What am I waiting for? It’s time to push through the fears, the doubts, and forcibly make room for ourselves in this vast space like everyone else who took a chance to make something out of nothing. I’ve done it once before when I freelanced full-time for two years, and if there’s anything I’ve learned since then, it’s that there’s no such thing as an overnight success. Every day, every achievement, every failure, brings you one step closer to that much coveted career jackpot prize.

Deciding to take action today could be the one simple step you need to take to change your life. If you ever wanted to lose weight, it never happened by going to sleep only to wake up and POOF – you’re 20 pounds lighter. It takes commitment and action to work out and eat healthier for actual change to happen. And the same applies to every aspects of our lives. We all have 24 hours in a day. Some people are just using those hours more wisely than others, and I for one, plan to do the same in my quest to become one of the lucky ones.

I saw a quote this week that really ignited a spark in me, and I hope it does for you, too. “Go to bed with dreams. Wake up with plans.” So let’s make plans to actually achieve our dreams.