Two-and-a-half years into the future

Two-and-a-half years ago I wrote the following article which appeared in my newsletter. I wanted to share something this week which completely exemplifies why I write and share.

To read the article first – click on here.

Mid-September, I received this comment on the blog post:

Hi Kirsty,

I am not sure if you will read this comment but I will write it anyway.

My name is Lauren and I am the person that you wrote this post about three years ago.

I would just like to say that I still have that email sent to my mum containing the article about me. In fact, I am sitting here looking at it now, it is pinned up on my pin board, which is where it has been for the past three years.

I can still remember when you came to my house and whilst you were here you asked me if you could write about me and I am really pleased that you did. When I read that article it taught me a lot of things:

One, that I do want to create the life I want, when I was twelve I only understood just the basics of something like this and now that I am a lot older I understand a whole lot more about life and I know that I definitely want to create my own life.

Two, to work hard for things and I know that this dream board showed me that if I set my mind to things I can achieve it and although I have long taken my dream board down off my wall it is still there, tucked away in my cupboard, away from viewing eyes and I still look at it from time to time just to remind myself to keep going and to never give up trying for something I want whether it may be a material thing like a pair of skis, a holiday or a long term thing like a job.

I would just like to share with you some of my accomplishments off of my dream board, although I have not completed all of my dreams on there and I may not complete all of them as some of them are no longer a dream of mine, I did complete the wants that I really did want to achieve.

One: I wanted to earn my very own pair of skis.

I achieved this one two years ago when I finally managed to conquer my fears and go outside of the wake on skis, I did this and once I did do that I became unstoppable. I went on to learn to slalom ski and am now hoping to get my own slalom ski as a result of this. To me this showed to me that I can do something if I set my mind to it and if anyone out there is worried because they might fall along the way, you just have to learn to get back up, brush yourself off and try again, exactly like I did when learning to go outside of the wake. If I fell off, I just got back up, put my skis back on and tried again! You can achieve anything you want to if you just try.

Two: I wanted to receive an A+ in school.

I can tell you that I have received many A+’s in school since then and I continue to receive to this very day.

Three: I had on my dream board that I wanted to become an architect and a chef.

Well as you get older, and I’m sure everyone knows this, you change your mind. So when I was 12 my dream was to become an architect and a chef but I have since changed that and I am now working towards becoming a lawyer. I am only in grade nine at the moment and my mind will probably change again but that is what it is right now.

The last thing on my dream board that I am going to tell you about is that I wanted to receive a medal in hockey. I have just finished my fourth year in hockey as the season just ended. On my dream board I did have a gold medal but the medal that I received was a lot better than a gold medal and I am proud of myself for getting it. It wasn’t a best and fairest or a most goal scorer or anything like that. It was a medal for the coach’s award, it isn’t a gold medal and it certainly doesn’t have the Olympic emblem on it but it shows to me that I can do it. I am only as good as what I think I am, I just did my best and by doing that I was rewarded and I am happy that I did because that just encouraged me to try harder and I did try harder because this year I got most goal scorer award and that is something I never thought I would get but I did and that is cause I believed in myself, I believed that I could do it and I did.

Thank you for writing that article about me in 2010, it has shown me what a great person I can be and I hope it showed other people that they can achieve things if they set their minds to it as well.

From Lauren

How cool is that? Where will you be two-and-a-half years into the future? What will you have achieved? Where do you need to write down or draw or cut out a picture to give you guidance? Lauren is still my hero – I want my little girl to read her story one day. Thank you for sharing in mine – and I hope you’ll continue to do so.

Kirsty Dunphey is the youngest ever Australian Telstra Young Business Woman of the Year, author of two books (her latest release is Retired at 27: If I Can do it Anyone Can) and a passionate entrepreneur who started her first business at age 15 and opened her own real estate agency at 21.

Now Kirsty does lots of fun things which you can read about here. Her favourite current projects are Elephant Property, a boutique property management agency, Baby Teresa, a baby clothing line that donates an outfit to a baby in need for each one they sell and ReallySold, which helps real estate agents stop writing boring, uninteresting ads.