Be an encourager

When I moved to Australia, I decided I wanted to work in social media, I decided I wanted to write a book and I decided I wanted to build my blog into something more than a hobby. I was met with excitement, optimism and support when I shared these ideas with people around me.

A few months down the line and I set foot back on British soil. Suddenly, my ideas sounded weak, stupid, unrealistic and self-indulgent. Suddenly, I felt like I was irritating and annoying people just by having these ideas.

Suddenly, putting these ideas into action felt a million times harder than it had in the Southern Hemisphere, where the wave of external support had kept me moving forward.

2+ years on and I work in social media, I’ve written a book and my blog is a bigger part of my life than I could ever have imagined. I did those things that so many people I trusted told me I couldn’t do.

I think it’s a crying shame that our gut reaction to the goals of others is often to be dismissive, to laugh, to bring them down a peg or two. As Daisy wrote the other day, it’s that toxic Crab Bucket Theory of dragging down others to your own level of insecurity.

In a bid to inject some encouragement amongst the crabs, I do my best to harness passion wherever I see it. The slightest hint of a goal in someone else and I ask them all about it, I get them to tell me what it is that makes this goal so important to them and how exactly they plan to reach it. I share my own experiences with them, I tell them that anything can happen and anything is possible.

We all need a little encouragement, and a little is all it takes to give someone else a leg up out of the bucket.