For years you have built up yourself to become the amazing person you are today. You have fallen and gotten back up countless times and still you seem to fight on. And all of this is just the beginning of your amazing journey ahead.

Finding yourself.

This hasn’t been an easy one and it won’t be. You have probably made some bad mistakes, lost a loved one, tried many new things, hated most of them but continued to carry on because you thought you had to. You have probably been made fun of based on your “style” and how you portray yourself. You have been kicked down hundreds of times and still you keep trucking forward. Why?

Because it gives you more of a reason to discover yourself. You will fall in and out of love, you will hurt mentally and physically, but these are going to be the days that make you. One by one, you will eliminate what you like versus what you don’t and you will begin to find self love and self confidence.

As many times as I have fallen, I have succeed. I failed because I didn’t know how to believe in myself. I knew what I was doing, I was well prepared, my work ethic and determination was never something that I lacked but confidence was.

I had many people who believed in me, who fed me positive energy, but I also had those who doubted me — and I seemed to be more attracted to their energy. I found myself listening to those who didn’t believe in me and questioning myself and who I was.

The sad thing I recently discovered was that I’m not alone. I would pretend that I was “strong” that what they said didn’t bother me, but I lost all confidence in myself.

I just finished up a recent Rugby 7’s tournament , in which our team played six taxing games, and took second to Siena in the Finals. We crushed the self doubt we had towards ourselves and conquered what we thought wouldn’t be done, going 5-1.

It wasn’t until I walked off the field of my last game that day, covered in mud, ripped white Nike leggings, one sock up the other down, soaked, and happy, that I realized the only reason we succeed after that first game was because we had the confidence to do so.

I lost my confidence over and over again, and it seemed every time I began to find it, something came up that knocked it right out of me. I had been out of physical activity for four weeks due to a very bad back injury, and that Sunday I decided to play. It wasn’t the smartest decision — and trust me, many people made sure I understood that — but I needed to do it for myself.

So that day I tied my cleats tight, taped them up and stepped on that wet field, nervous, not sure what was going to happen and ended up playing the best I ever had, scoring two tries in my first game back. Boom. It was the boost I needed to bring my confidence back and slowly it did.

What I want people to understand is that it's (confidence) not going to happen quickly, and your going to hit the ground hard. But I promise you can find yourself. You need to allow yourself to be genuinely happy and you need to love yourself, and the first step to doing that is believing in who you are and who you are becoming. Accept yourself.

I'm a junior in college, I’m 21; I don’t know where my future is going, and I don’t want to know. I just want to be happy and continue to find out who I am.

I have been bullied, I have transferred schools, I have given up, I have loved, I have almost quit life, I have succeed, I have failed, I have hated, I have cried for hours, I have physically hurt myself, I have mentally drained myself, I have prayed, I have given in, I have been verbally abused — but I believe in who I am and where I am going and I know I will conquer all that is ahead of me.

This is a journey so beautiful and never ending.

Good luck, love yourself, and believe in who you are.

You will go far, my friend.