The other day I saw a meme on Facebook that said, “ do something today that your future self will thank you for.” I am all for this from a health standpoint, but it was being used on this occasion as a marketing technique to encourage someone to invest in a business seminar.It got me thinking about how in the hell I got here.Back in 2016, with no understanding of what I wanted to do with my time or my life, I was obsessed with figuring out my calling. I pored through articles about how to find your passion, took countless interest inventories, asked everyone I knew what their dream job was…and still could never, ever, in a million and a half years have told you I was going to find my calling in coaching. EVER.Sometimes we box ourselves in by thinking we have to stick to a plan just because we chose to try it. I committed to this, I've declared this is what I'm doing, and if I walk away now, it's failure.If I had stuck to the plan, if I had kept trudging down the road of safe office jobs into stagnation and let my joy weaken, I would have missed out on the magical, wonderful, terrifying path that is coaching.Risk can, at times, be the only way to discern our true path. How many times have you encountered something that lights up your soul, only to abandon it because it was impractical or wouldn't pay the bills, or someone might think it was weird or silly or uncomfortable?How many times have you kept on keeping on with something that was not serving you because it was what you were "supposed" to do, or because you didn't want to fail at it? Guess what...if you are spending the majority of the time doing something that is not serving you or that you are not passionate about, failure is the last thing you should be worrying about. We have failed when we have suppressed our joy and our passions because of someone else's opinion or perception.This has kept coming up in my circle of people lately:"I'm not going to do this thing I'm really really excited about, because I don't know how to do it perfectly.""I'm not going to do this thing I'm really really excited about, because people might not get it.""I'm not going to do this thing I'm really really excited about, because it's risky, and it's not in the plan, and I may fail."I have heard all of these things lately, but I also spent years and years saying it to myself. For years, I lived my life based on fear. Fear of what people would think, fear of failure, fear of what would happen if I couldn't pay my bills or if I tried something and didn't like it.Finally, I made peace with the fact that I didn't know how anything was going to turn out, I couldn't know how anything was going to turn out, and if I just stayed stuck, I would look back and have a ton of regrets.I've learned that it's much more fun to dream, and plan and hope. There's a buzz of excitement that comes with getting intentional about what you'd like to accomplish, while remaining open to anything and everything that might present itself to you.I am a firm believer that our souls come here on a mission, and we are presented with opportunities to accomplish that mission throughout our lives, and when we feel that draw, we do better by following it. No matter how many times we might delay pursuing an opportunity, it is never too late to decide to pursue our mission, our passion, and find our path.