Nobody ever became successful by just going with the flow. Whether you look at the richest people in the world or political revolutionaries or entrepreneurs, the most successful of the bunch had an idea that most people likely saw as ludicrous but were ultimately proved wrong in a spectacular way. Susan B. Anthony faced resistance in pushing for women to obtain the right to vote, yet almost no one today would deny that she fought for a very worthy cause. George Washington and the Founding Fathers waged a war against the most powerful country in the world for what they called "a more perfect union," and against all the odds came out victorious. History is filled with such inspiring stories, yet most people today will simply listen to these stories and still give up on their own dreams. Big mistake.

You've had dreams before. What did you want to be when you were ten years old? Do you still have the same dream? If not, what changed? I have seen and met a plethora of people who are incredibly smart, talented and ambitious set their goals far lower than they should, all because they have this instinctive fear of aiming too high and being laughed at. Their "real" dreams simply aren't realistic, they say, so they settle for something they're not exactly unhappy with but ultimately isn't what they truly want, and they convince themselves that this is the best route they can take towards success in their lives.

I hate to sound depressing, but life is short, much shorter than we realize. Most of us writing articles on this platform are in our late teens or early twenties, and I don't know about you, but I easily remember being eight years old and thinking that high school was ages away. Now it's been almost four years since I graduated high school, and I will be graduatingcollege next semester. Time is relentless, and the years fly by. Believe me when I say that it will not be long before you look back and realize that your college days were 20 or 30 years ago, and that your children will be getting ready to graduate themselves.

It's scary. The process happens so fast that most people don't realize what's happening until it's too late, and then they find themselves at the end of their lives full of regrets, on their deathbeds feeling emotionally miserable. When it's too late, when they can't do anything to change their lives, then they realize that the should never have given up on their dreams.

But look at you. You're still in college, and you have a power that millions of people still alive today once had but never acted upon and are now filled with regret. You have the power to choose your major in college, to choose who you get to hang and interact with or to choose the path you want to be on. Right now, you have the power to change, and more importantly, you have the time to change. Look deep down inside of yourself, find that person you ultimately want to become (it doesn't matter who that is - rock star, actor, author or traveler, you know exactly who that is) and hold onto that dream. If people laugh at you when you share that dream, laugh back at them - they're probably just jealous and gave up on their own dreams long ago. Prove them wrong by not listening to them and showing up 10, 20 or 30 years down the road as the person they thought you could never become. You will have lived your one and only life the way you wanted to live it, and a long time from now, you will die happy and fulfilled.

I'll end with a quote by Steve Jobs that every young person on this planet facing opposition or resistance to their dreams should hear and take to heart for the rest of their lives: "Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."