Do you realize how powerful you are?
Not in a motivational-poster way. In a real, lived, already-inside-you way. Like you really are that girl, or that guy, or that they, or that… whatever you identify as.
But you are that person.
I’ve been returning to that question, do you realize how powerful you are, quietly in my own solitude. This season of my life has been less about making noise and more about planting seeds, the kind of quiet preparation that feels natural for winter.
Exactly a year ago, I was waiting. For permission. For clarity. For someone to tell me when it was time to move and how big the move should be. I outsourced my confidence more than I realized, letting other people’s certainty stand in for my own.
The space I occupy now is unrecognizable, truly unrecognizable, from that version of me.
I don’t need to be told when to jump or how high. I don’t need approval to begin. I’m making decisions in the face of uncertainty instead of waiting for it to disappear. That part is very important.
The shift within me didn’t come without discomfort. Reacclimating to myself was very intimidating. Remembering how to trust my instincts again took practice and commitment.
But here’s what surprised me. I was NEVER missing anything. I already had the tools. I just stopped giving myself permission to use them.
In the past two months, I’ve applied to grants, accelerators, and programs I never would have even opened before. Not because I wasn’t qualified. Not because I wasn’t capable. But because I doubted my own power. And once I named that, the fear lost some of its authority.
I’m strutting into 2026 differently.
More grounded. More self-directed. More willing to move even when my voice shakes. I’m not waiting to feel fearless. That may be miles away. But I’m choosing to trust myself anyway.
This letter is for anyone who has been playing small out of habit, not truth. For anyone who needs the reminder that their power hasn’t gone anywhere. It’s been here the whole time.
If that’s you, then this letter is for us.
Dear You,
There are moments when you doubt your own power.
Not because it isn’t there, but because you’ve learned to keep it contained. You’ve learned to call restraint maturity, hesitation wisdom, playing small humility. Doubt can sound convincing when it wears all of those layers.
But doubt is not truth.
It’s often just fear asking to stay in charge.
You did not arrive where you are by accident. Every step, including the delayed ones and the uncertain ones, required choice. Required courage. It all required you. The fact that you question yourself does not mean you are unqualified. More often, it means you are standing near something that matters enough to scare you.
Power isn’t the absence of fear.
It’s the willingness to act without waiting for fear to disappear.
Ask yourself:
Where have I mistaken caution for truth?
What changes if I stop being the one who holds myself back?
If you’re looking for ease, really sit with these questions.
Your power is not something you earn later.
And it is not something granted by approval or success. It lives in your ability to choose, to begin, to take yourself seriously.
So take yourself seriously.
You are not becoming powerful. You are simply remembering that you already are.
With you in the remembering,
Kasim