Welcome to another edition of Unshakable, Unbreakable, Unstoppable Stories with Bonnie Jean.
Average. Normal. Ordinary. Invisible. Unnoticed. That’s the way I felt all through middle school and high school and college. I felt that way because I never truly excelled at anything I did.
I wanted to, though. I wanted to be extraordinary. I wanted to be recognized, to be noticed, to be great.
I remember being about 14 or 15 and standing in my bedroom feeling frustrated and depressed. I can see the exact spot in my room where I was standing the moment this thought entered my mind for the very first time: “I wish I could find that one thing I’m great at, that one thing I’m better at than anyone else.”
I wanted to be dainty and fashionable and popular, but I wasn’t any good at being ‘cool.’
I wasn’t a nerd either. I made good grades, but I wasn’t the best student. Other kids in my class were smarter and made better grades without studying as much as I did.
I wasn’t great at anything musical. I couldn’t sing well and I never learned how to play an instrument, so being great as a singer or musician was out of the question.
I secretly wanted to be a great actress, but I was too timid to try out for any plays in high school. Besides, I played sports year round and took the toughest classes available to me, so I didn’t have time to act anyway.
That seemed to leave sports as my chance at finding greatness. But on every team I played for, at least one teammate was better than me. I wanted to be a great softball player, but I just didn’t have the talent to go where my dreams wanted to take me.
That’s why I felt frustrated that day. I knew in my heart of hearts that although I was a good athlete, I wasn’t great and that no matter how hard I tried, I would always be just good, ordinary and average. I played with people better than me, and they didn’t try near as hard. I gave everything I had, but that was never enough.
So I wanted to find that one thing. That one thing where I could be the best. I prayed for God to show me what that was so that I could stand out and be recognized and noticed.
I wanted to know what it felt like to be in the spotlight. To have people come to me for advice. To have people come to me for help. To have people look up to me.
I didn’t discover that one thing until years later. That’s because the one thing I have the chance to be great at came so naturally to me that I didn’t even realize I was more talented than the majority of people in that area.
I just assumed everyone was as good at it as I was because it seemed so easy, so normal and so usual to be able to do.
I overlooked my talent, so I got a late start developing it. I haven’t reached a level of greatness yet, but I will. It’s just going to take a lot of practice, a lot of learning and a lot of confidence.
My one thing is writing. You have one thing, too. You have the chance to figure it out now, to start developing it now. So by the time you are my age, you will have already reached a level of greatness and will be on your way to superior excellence.
Think about it. What do you do better than anyone else around you?
It can be anything. The way you make friends. Sports. Music. Writing. Acting. Dancing. Design.
You have a gift, a natural talent, one thing you’re great at. Find out what your one thing is, then challenge yourself to become better and better at that.
That’s how you develop and build your unshakable confidence.
To Your Dreams,
Bonnie Jean
P.S. Please don’t wait as long as I did to find your unshakable confidence! Life is really much more fun when you set goals and take action to make them happen. No matter how old you are, you can be an unshakable, unbreakable, unstoppable Dream Doer today! To help, I want to give you three FREE gifts, which includes the entire audio book of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets. To claim your FREE gifts, visit TheDreamDoers.com now.
