I found it quite difficult to pass on just one piece of advice when there is so much I wanted to tell my younger self; to prepare her for and to protect her from. But then I realised that if she doesn’t go through it, then we wouldn’t become the person we are today. Instead, I decided to give advice relevant to what is to come but also allows younger me the freedom to make those mistakes, take the unpaved path, and live her life as only she can! So here goes...

To my younger self,

We were always eager to get to the next stage of everything we did, so would run before we could walk…even as a baby we walked before we could crawl! But while some may herald us as a child genius for this (*ahem* our parents), in life, it brings its own challenges.

Because we went straight to walking, we never learned everything we needed to, like that minor yet important step of how to get from standing to sitting. So, after our adventure across the sitting room to reclaim our favourite toy from the clutches of our devious cocker spaniel, we would just stop dead in our tracks, timber like a freshly chopped tree, and face plant! We had our whole family on high alert for that precarious moment when we stopped walking so they could catch us before we fell.

What I wanted to share with you is that you might not always have someone there to catch you. So, in everything you do, don’t jump in head (or face) first. Take the time to learn the steps and walk before you run...or in our case, crawl before you walk!

Now over to all of you: if you had the chance to pass on advice to your younger self, knowing that if you did there was a chance it would change who you are today, would you do it?