If statistics are right, my life will not amount to much. A small cubical with an incompetent boss, a bored husband and ungrateful children are what my anticipated future will equate to, if society is correct. Somehow, if I manage to crawl out from the degrading title placed upon me, I could be legendary.

Marvelous castles would be built as I marked my place in this world. I would be called amazing as I defeated monsters and traveled the world helping those who cannot help themselves.

Visions of castles first came to be when I was very young. Foundations were built in Ethiopia when I saw people on the streets without a penny to their name. Sparks were ignited as I walked out of my comfortable house and saw people freezing, starving and begging for scraps. The unfairness of the world was revealed to me every day and every day my resolve to redeem humanity strengthened. Everything was planned and set. I was to become a doctor, treat the poor for free and help them set up a new life. My future was set at the age of five.

At 18, my resolve gave away when anxiety and depression stormed in. Foundations that seemed to be set in stone crumbled as everything I thought defined me fell way. I lost sight of my kingdom as I began the perilous fight to not only build a sustainable castle but to also rediscover myself.

My tainted soul was laid bare before me and my beliefs went on trial. One by one I examined by beliefs and slowly grasped the fact that I had started to fade into the background noise. No longer did I have a strong conviction in anything, everything is believed in with casual passion. After careful evaluation, my marvelous castles won over my apathetic mind, uncovered my foundations, and reignited the sparks.

Throughout the process of reassembling myself, I was constantly reminded of Anne Lamott, a famous author, when she said “we begin to find and become ourselves when we are already found, already truly, entirely, wildly, messily, marvelously who we are born to be.” My future of defeated monsters, generosity, glory, honor and marvelous castles are written in stone. Who I am meant to be is already decided, my path, however, is still under construction.