Many mornings were the same feeling of dread deep down in my stomach, I felt sick. I didn’t want to go to school that morning or any other morning for that matter. I HATED IT! I hated having no choice but to have to face the bullies who tormented me every day.

Each day the feeling of sickness and dread became more difficult to bare and having to make up yet another excuse to my mum so I didn’t have to go to school was starting to wear hugely thin. The lies I was telling, the emotional pain I was going through, was just unbearable and I felt locked in a prison of loneliness that nobody else understood and it was extremely isolating.

I was the child who came from a family on a tight budget, we didn’t have a lot of money and I was 1 of 5 children, so with a family of 7 cramped into a 3-bed roomed house and 7 mouths to feed, you can only imagine that I was not exactly blessed to wear the best clothes and trainers that were trending on the market at that time for teenagers.

In fact, my clothes and trainers were often stolen from washing lines and the school’s lost property box. Now as you can imagine, this made me a very easy target for bullies to pick fun at me because I was wearing a hand me down jumper that had come from my 2 sisters before me, or my clothes were not as expensive as some of the kids in my school.

Each day would be another day of torment and I’d try to keep my head down while I hung around with my only two friends, Joanne and Lisa. They, like me, experienced the torment of bully’s day in and day out. The days when Joanne and Lisa were not at school were a nightmare for me because I would have to sit alone during break times or hide in the library if there was room for me to sit, just so I could keep out of sight from the pupils that made my life a living hell.

When really, I had such a desire in my heart to be like the popular girls in school, the ones that had long flowing beautiful hair, long nails, beautiful clothes, a ton of friends and lived in gorgeous homes and seemed to have a perfect life…. Or did they?

Now I look back and see exactly what the real situation was and know why I experienced the things I did in my life. I may have started out in my life as the poor bullied kid with a rubbish childhood, but I grew up to became the face, voice, words and books that transform thousands of people’s lives daily!

Today, I am an 18x Best-selling author, one of the world’s most Top Professional Coaches published in the international best-selling book: The Coaching Code which was compiled by Betsy Chasse, Award-winning Filmmaker of What the Bleep Do We Know?! and best-selling author of Tipping Sacred Cows.

I am also an International Coach and Editor of The Missing Piece Magazine. As a coach, I help authors and professionals grow their platforms by teaching them how to publish, market and sell their books to international best-seller status. I have had the honor and pleasure of consulting TV personalities and award-winning Hollywood film directors and created over 200 best-selling authors to date.

However, I wouldn’t be who I am today if I had not had the life I started out with. You see I grew up deciding that if I couldn’t control what happened to me in childhood, I was certainly going to control what happened in my adulthood. Back then, I was different because my adulthood wasn’t going to be like the average person because I felt I was created for something much bigger but I couldn’t yet see what it was, and wouldn’t learn for another 30 years.

I must say, the girls I envied in school were not the shiny fantasy that I thought they were back then. It turns out the biggest reason they were popular was because they would let boys sleep with them so easily, and they were so deeply insecure to be liked that they were willing to do anything to make it happen.

I also learnt that bullies need to pick on their victims so they feel empowered, but once you take that power away and stop showing them you fear them, the bullying stops. It’s your fear that makes them continue and by learning to react differently towards them, will shock them and they may no longer pick on you because it is your fear that empowered them.

I want to tell you all of this today to inspire you! To let you know that if you are bullied, a square peg in a round hole, or feel like you don’t fit into society, it is because you have been created for much bigger things that you cannot yet see. Even though it does not make sense right now, I want you to know that you have the power inside to become whoever you want to become and achieve whatever you want to achieve.

Do you know why? Because I know. Because I am living proof!

About the Author: Kate GARDNER is a #1 International Best-Selling Author, Editor in Chief of The Missing Piece Magazine, and Publisher of the International Best-Selling Book Series The Missing Piece. As a coach, Kate helps business owners grow their platforms by teaching them how to publish, market and sell their books to international best-seller status. Kate has had the honor and pleasure of consulting TV personalities and award-winning Hollywood film directors. Read more…

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