December 13, 2024
This post is part of my 30in30 challenge, where I write 30 minutes every day for 30 working days. Due to my limited time for this challenge, the content will be only very lightly researched and edited. The idea is to just write. Find my voice, and find the courage to publish. To follow my curiosity wherever it may take me.
Today, I had an epiphany. I was out horse riding in the grey, wet, cold English countryside when it hit me: I’m living my dream. The very life I once imagined, hoped for, and worked toward for years had quietly become my reality—and I hadn’t even noticed.
Horses have always been my passion. Ever since I can remember, I’ve been obsessed with them. As a teenager, I spent my weekends and holidays at the stables, going to horse shows and watching sunsets from the saddle. But then life happened—school, responsibilities—and except for the occasional horse-related fix, I drifted away from that world until my late 30s.
Yet the dream never faded. The vision of owning or at least being around horses remained lodged in my heart. Some dreams are only ever meant to stay dreams—but not this one. When my kids grew older and I had some financial freedom, I decided to invest in myself and book horse riding lessons to get back in the saddle, so to speak (pun intended). Before long, through friends, I became part of a wonderful group of women who co-own four incredible horses. I had dreamed of having one horse—and now, I have four!
This morning, while riding, I suddenly realized the enormity of it. The weather was awful—cold, drizzly—but there I was, on horseback. Alone. Walking, trotting, cantering—moving in harmony with a powerful animal that could, quite frankly, kill me if it wanted to.
I was living what I had wished, hoped, and prayed for my whole life. And yet, it would have been so easy to miss this realization—to be distracted by the miserable weather, my fatigue, or the stresses of life.
Coding is another one. Eight years ago, when I started learning how to code, all I wanted was to get a job. I wanted someone to believe in me and give me a chance, even though I was in my mid-30s, a mother of three with a whole lot of responsibilities but no relevant tech experience and very little coding knowledge.
Eight years ago, it felt impossible.
Eight years later, I not only have the job I wished for, but I also have an amazing community of people around me who believe in me, encourage me, and want me to succeed.
How many special moments have I overlooked because I was too consumed by life’s demands to recognize them? How often have I dismissed magical experiences because my mind was already chasing the next thing?
I'm not going to be too hard on myself for missing these moments—that’s just the nature of being human. But that doesn’t mean I won’t try harder to notice them.
Even when the weather is awful, and the code doesn’t work, I’m still living my dream.