Last night, I was laying down watching TV when I randomly started looking around me. And for a moment, it really hit me: I have so many of the things I used to dream about having as a kid. I’m living so much of the life that younger me could only imagine. I come from very humble beginnings. There were times when I didn’t know where my next meal was coming from. I’d go to school on an empty stomach and nobody would know. At one point, finding shoes that fit me became so difficult that I wore sandals everywhere. When they broke, I stitched them back together and kept going. Same thing with clothes. I’ve been extremely nearsighted for as long as I can remember and couldn’t always afford to replace my glasses, so when they broke, tape and glue had to do the job. Then there’s basketball.I didn’t even start playing until I was 16 years old. And somehow, by the grace of God, that kid went on to play basketball at the highest level in the world. And I’m still going. Sometimes I think about how few people have ever been built like me. At my height and size, God also blessed me with physical abilities that I don’t think most people fully realize. But I do. And maybe that’s part of what hit me last night. Sometimes we spend so much time thinking about where we’re trying to go that we forget to look around and appreciate how far God has already brought us. I need to remind myself of that more often. To be grateful for what God has done for me. For what He has done through me. For what He continues to do. For every blessing I prayed for, and even the ones I didn’t know to pray for. And I also realized something else: Whatever opinions exist out there don’t define me. I know what I’m capable of. I know what I’ve overcome. I know what God has placed inside of me. My life has already taught me that what looks unlikely to other people doesn’t mean much when God has written something different for you. From a kid going to school hungry, wearing stitched up sandals and taped up glasses… to living a life that kid once dreamed about. Alhamdulillah for all of it. And the story isn’t finished yet. God made me one of one.