What

Description

Growing up, I believed I could become anything. Do anything. No one ever told me my dreams were too big, or too unrealistic.

As the years passed, hitting walls and obstacles, something happened to that ability to look to the stars. I started hiding my dreams, partly because I didn’t want to look like a failure when they didn’t come through and partly because I stopped believing I could achieve them.  I stopped dreaming and I fiercely told myself, and people around me, I did not want certain things.

As luck would have it, that view was unexpectedly challenged by an innocent comment made by my boss at that point in time. First, it made me laugh out loud. But honestly, even I could hear the hurt hiding behind the laugh and it made me start on the journey that has taken me where I am today.

Admitting my first goal, to myself and others, was incredibly hard, but once spoken out loud - I reached it in half the time I thought possible with the help of people around me. After that, it has been a weird chain of events taking me through public speaking, collaborating with people I admire, being elected into boards and other positions, creating a card deck, writing a book and even singing on stage!

What this journey has taught me is that I do indeed have dreams, aspirations. They might be incredibly hard to find after years of oppressing them, but once you start looking - they start appearing everywhere!

And speaking them out loud - you will find that people everywhere will go out of their way to help you achieve them!

So, don’t be careful what you wish for!
Wish for the moon and the stars and be prepared to reach them, and so much more.

Speaker

Lena Nyström

Engineering manager, Author and Public Speaker

Lena has been building software since 1999. After a decade of coding they found their heart in testing and that is close to their heart even today when they focus on building organisations and growing people rather than the software itself. Continuous improvement is a core value and they believe we should all strive to keep up to date and challenge ourselves, our assumptions and the way things are done. Lena is the author and creator of "Would Heu-risk it?" (card deck and book), avid blogger, speaker and workshop facilitator. On top of that, Lena combines skills learned through the years in their day job as Engineering Manager. Lena lives outside of Stockholm, Sweden with teenage kids, partner and way too much games, sewing machines and books.