I’m going to start this out with a confession. As of today, I am now a licensed driver. While I am relieved to have finally gotten past that obstacle, I am still a little reluctant to admit that I didn’t get my license until I was twenty-one. The reason for this delay was that damned monster known as anxiety. Sitting behind the wheel of a car sent me into panic attacks and I bust out into tears on more than one occasion in order to avoid driving. Anxiety, in general, has had a deep impact on my life since I was in high school. Looking back on it now, there were a lot of things I wish I had known then. What is important, however, is that I can finally keep moving forward into my twenties with a new sense of confidence.

I decided I will share some of my favorite (literary) quotes about learning to keep moving forward and accepting yourself even when you don’t feel you are at your best.

“I wasn’t born to be soft and quiet. I was born to make the world shatter and shake at my fingertips.” – Unknown

“She was never quite ready. But she was brave. And the universe listens to brave.” – Rebecca Ray

“Still, like air, I rise.” – Dr. Maya Angelou

“The minute you think of giving up, think of the reason you held on for so long.” – Unknown

“The courage it took to get out of bed each morning to face the same things over and over was enormous.” – Charles Bukowski

“Time heals nothing unless you move along with it.” – Rachel Wokhin

“We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we’re curious and curiosity keep leading us down new paths.” – Walt Disney

“There is a stubbornness about me that never can bear to be frightened at the will of others. My courage always rises at every attempt to intimidate me.” – Jane Austen

“Nobody important? Blimey, do you know that in nine hundred years of time and space I’ve never met anyone who wasn’t important before?” – The Eleventh Doctor

“I am the one thing in life I can control. I am inimitable. I am an original.” – Aaron Burr from Hamilton: An American Musical