The hardest respect to earn is our own.
Nothing could be truer for me.
Degree after degree, career after career, I looked for fulfillment and happiness in all the wrong places. I was chasing success, whatever that meant. As a first-generation kid, I thought it was up to me to bring success to my family. I thought if I worked hard enough, accomplished enough, and built an impressive enough resume, I would finally feel like I had earned my place in the world. Maybe it would even make up for how obviously gay I was (and still am). Maybe if I became successful enough, no one could question whether I belonged. But after the degrees and the careers came, I still didn't find the fulfillment and happiness I was looking for.
I wasn't actually chasing success. I was chasing permission.
Permission to believe I was good enough.
Permission to take up space.
Permission to be exactly who I was.
The problem is, no degree, job title, promotion, or accomplishment can give you permission to be yourself. That's something only you can give yourself. I learned that the hard way in my ambitious journey.
After graduate school, I joined an accounting firm in San Antonio that promised everyone we were "like family." Then they let me go without notice right after they got all the work they needed from me during tax season. Later, they wouldn't even let my mentor at the firm write me a letter of recommendation for law school.
The law firm I chose after law school wasn't any better. When I returned after spending a week in Mexico for my grandfather's death and burial, the managing partner told me my absence was inconvenient. I remember thinking,
"This place doesnât give a fuck about me."
Each time I reached a new goal and didn't feel the fulfillment I dreamed of, I set another crazy goal and thought that accomplishment would be the one to finally quiet the voice in my head asking whether I was finally good enough. I wanted to prove to my inner judge that I was worthy. That I deserved to take up space. That I had earned my place in the world.
I remember one night after an entrepreneur event, my co-founder, Caroline and I went to dinner. At the time, we were both working at a law firm together while planning Blazers with Chandler. Somehow we ended up talking about how neither of us felt good enough. I started laughing because the whole conversation felt ridiculous.
"WE don't think we're good enough?!
Bitch! We're literally lawyers!!!"
We laughed at how ridiculous we sounded. But it's clear to see, it's easy to see someone else's worth, while completely missing your own.
Lately, I've realized I've been doing that my entire life. Even after opening Blazers, I struggled to call myself CEO. Not because I wasn't doing the work, but because I worried it sounded too arrogant. A friend asked me one simple question, "Are you doing the job of CEO?" I replied, "Yes." She asked, "Then?"
That was it. She wasn't giving me permission. She was reminding me that I didn't need it. And I think that's what this season of my life has been teaching me. Sometimes we spend our entire lives waiting for someone else to confirm something that is already true.
We wait for our company to finally recognize our worth. We wait for our family to finally understand our choices. We wait until we feel qualified enough to start the business, change careers, move cities, create something, or pursue the dream we've been thinking about for years. We wait for someone to tell us we're allowed. But what if they never do?
What if the permission you've been waiting for was always yours to give?
I think this is why every meaningful dream requires a little bit of delusion. Not the kind where you ignore reality. The kind where you believe in a reality that doesn't exist yet. Society gives us a blueprint for a respectable life. Go to school. Get the stable job. Follow the path that's already been proven. Don't take too many risks. Don't be too different. Don't make people uncomfortable.
But every person who creates something new, every person who chooses a different path, every trailblazer has a moment where they have to ask themselves:
"What if there's another way?"
A few years ago, moving to New York without a job and opening a women's sports bar with two people I barely knew probably sounded delusional as fuck. It still does. The voices in my head were loud. "What the fuck are you doing?!" And my answer was usually: "I have no fucking clue." But I believed there was another way. And eventually, the thing that once felt impossible became my everyday life.
Now, I look around Blazers and see people walking through our doors and telling us they feel seen. I hear people say we inspired them. I see a community that exists because we were willing to believe in something before everyone else could see it. And I think that's the beautiful thing about owning who you are.
The quicker we find ourselves, the quicker we find the people who are meant for us.
Because the people who love the real you can't find you if you're busy pretending to be someone else.
So this week I want you to ask yourself:
What part of your life are you waiting for someone else to give you permission to live?
Because the life you're waiting for doesn't begin when someone finally approves of it. It begins when you remind yourself you don't need anyone's permission.
I believe in you. I believe in us!
Con amor<3
Debany DĂĄvila Salinas
