June. The mid-year point. Six month’s down, six month’s to go.

Despite starting this year during a lockdown, I can reflect back and appreciate that was the break I needed. 2020 was a year full of lockdowns but I perhaps didn’t use the ‘down-time’ to the best of my advantage. That said, we probably achieved more in 2020 than we truly realise – improved our resilience and realised what was most important in our lives. 

In the first six month’s of 2021, I would say I have achieved more than I set out to and probably more than I believed I could or even thought I deserved. Despite these achievements, the key life lesson here has been: self-doubt can be crippling.

Self-doubt is part of being human but if we fail to address it, then there is the potential for it to spiral and get out of control. This in turn then has an impact on our goals for the future and how much we dare to dream. But doubts are not the truth, and similarly to a previous blog post, these thoughts are not real. They are also said to be the opposite to what is actually true and so challenging these thoughts is key.

When we see others achieving amazing goals, we often don’t see the journey they have taken to get there and the adversity they have overcome along the way. It may then seem a bit predictable of me, at this time, to link this point with the England Football Club Manager, Gareth Southgate, OBE. The England Manager who was told during his apprenticeship at Crystal Palace that he would never make it as a footballer; the England Manager who failed to score that penalty in the Euro ’96 Semi-Final against Germany, and the same Manager who has taken England to the final of major tournament, Euro 2020, for the first time in 55 years. Euro 2020 itself wouldn’t have been plain sailing, and after one of the matches in the Group stages of the tournament, I remember watching Graham Souness on TV saying ‘Football’s not coming home with that team out there I can tell you that now.’ Reporters were also saying Harry Kane wasn’t fit, and there were players on the bench being left out of the starting line-up that shouldn’t have been. Allowing those negative comments to creep in, impact on mindset and the team’s strategy, would probably mean we would have been looking at a very different Euro 2020 Final.

The other factor to achieving your goals can also be luck – being in the right place at the right time. And if you have that feeling of luck never being on your side, then it’s time to create your own. Stepping outside of your comfort zone isn’t always easy but is sometimes necessary in order to develop the connections and bring the opportunities that you long for.

As we move into July, it leaves just under 6 months for the remainder of the year. 

Be brave. Anything is possible.