Discovery - Martina Stipan
Ever since I was little, I’ve lived for the feeling of discovery.
The spark when the right message hits me at just the right time. The empowering aliveness of a striking idea. That’s what I’ve always wanted to share through my writing.
But instead of leaning into that purpose, I took the low-risk path. I went into consulting, and then corporate strategy. Desperately trying to convince myself I could be happy working to increase ad clicks.
Over time, I felt more and more dissonance brewing within. I had drifted so far out of alignment with myself that it manifested physically into chronic pain.
Sure, I was “successful”, but in whose eyes? My family? My peers? What the fuck did it matter if it wasn’t my own?
At that point, I realized if I never trusted myself to win at my own game, I would get stuck trying to play other people’s games for the rest of my life. So, I took the leap to pursue writing full-time.
It wasn’t easy. It’s still not. But it feels difficult in all the right ways — which is how any truly rewarding path will feel.
People see betting on yourself as risky. But to me, the biggest threat is realizing I wasted decades of my life trying to live up to somebody else’s standards.
Fuck. That.
That’s simply not a risk I’m willing to take.