I was 23 years old, and my best friend and I just spent six months backpacking around Europe.  

And it got to that moment, we’re sitting at this gorgeous little cafe in London, having a cup of tea, a little English breakfast, of course, and we’re sipping away and we’ve worked out we’ve got one week’s worth of money left in our bank account, and then we’re ‘skint’.  

So we’ve just had six months backpacking around Europe.  

Now at a time, I was 23, when there was no WiFi, no internet, no emails, no FaceTime, no mobile phones or anything.   

We’d been living completely independently, bar the odd, you know ‘reverse charges’ phone call every now and then, but completely independently.  

And now suddenly we had one week’s worth of money left.  

Anyway, we’re sort of looking at each other sipping this beautiful cup of warm English Breakfast tea and I remember my best friend looked at me and she said, “I know Kim, I know, why don’t we, with the money we’ve got, let’s whip over and have a week in Spain?”  

Because we hadn’t been to Spain yet, it’s probably one of the only countries we hadn’t yet visited.  

“We’ll have a week over there, then we’ll come back.”   

And we already had a pre-paid return flight back to Australia.  

And she said, “Why don’t we do that, does that.. what do you think?”  

And I remember sitting there and having a cup of this beautiful warm English Breakfast tea and I remember thinking, no, I don’t actually want to do that.   

And I said, “I don’t think I want to do that.”   

Anyway, my best friend nearly choked on her cup of tea and we’re besties, we’ve been best friends since we were 13 right, and we’d done nearly everything together.  

So she’s kind of “what do you mean you don’t want to do that?” totally mortified.  

She’s like, “what are you going to do?”   

And I said to her, “I think I want to stay here in London.”   

Anyway, once she got her breath back and got past the near choking from the tea, she said, “what are you going to do?   

What are you going to do here in London?  

You’ve got no money (almost), you’ve got no friends, you’ve got no job, you’ve got nowhere to live, what are you going to do?”   

And I never will forget that sense of calm and clarity that just came over me.  

And I said to her, “do you know what, I’m going to work it out.  

I’ll get a job, I’ll find somewhere to live,” because we’ve been staying in this beautiful little bed and breakfast right in the heart and the hustle and bustle of London.  

It was reasonably cheap, compared to other places in London, but it wasn’t cheap when you knew you only had a week’s worth of money left.  

And I said, “you know, I will find somewhere to live, I’ll find a job and I’ll make friends, right?”  

I’m 23, course I’ll do it.   

That total sense of ‘I’ve got this’, I can do this, and backing myself was just so real and so overwhelmingly right at that time. 

And it was it was quite funny because I did end up staying in London, and I stayed for another 18 months to two years.   

And yeah, I did get myself a job, I did find somewhere to live, and I did make a lot of friends, friends that I’ve still got to this day.   

And I just worked it out.   

And it’s really funny cause that was absolutely the turning point in my life, when I knew that owning my own decisions was so important.   

And obviously, there’s events that had taken place in my life where I wasn’t able to own my decisions.  

So that empowerment that I got at that moment, where that decision was completely mine, I owned it.   

I also owned all the good, the bad, and the ugly that came with it, mind you mostly good, but that was such an important part in my life.   

And that’s also part of why I’m self-employed, why I work with others who are self-employed and who run their own business and who do that because having that control and owning their decisions is important to them.  

So that kind of is my story about why I do or part of why I do, or part of why I do what I do.  

And it was that moment in time, like I said, upon reflection that really cemented that in my life.  

So that’s my story.  

What’s yours?  

What’s that moment, or that time, or that event, or that aha, or that feeling that you got and what happened at that time?  

Where were you?   

What did it feel like?  

What did it look like?  

What’s your story?  

I would absolutely love to know.  

Because it’s a nice way to understand why someone’s doing what they’re doing, but also understanding a little bit more about them and who they are as a person.   

And that’s gotta be good, right?  

We’re in relationships.  

We’re dealing with other humans.  

So what’s your story?  

How did you get to doing what you’re doing or what was that moment?   

Please share?   

I’d be delighted to know.  

And don’t ever forget that You are Valuable