2015 has been a whirlwind of a year. Last year at this time, I NEVER would have thought that I would be where I am now. If you told me that I would be going to New York City to tape on Dr.OZ and MSNBC, I would have called you crazy. It’s surreal. More like unreal. I know that it didn’t happen because of luck. I know that it happened because of a variety of things. I am here to say that hard work and persistence pays off. I am here to say that you can do anything that you put your mind to.

I am going to get real here. For most of my life, I have lacked self-confidence. From the outside, it looked like I had it all together. I was a television reporter in a great market. I had tons friends. I dated. I got married. Life was good. But on the inside, I didn’t always see it as others did.  I was not always confident that I was good at what I did. When I launched my own public relations business, I must admit, I was a little apprehensive. Would my years of experience take me to where I want to go? Would I be successful?

Slowly, I began to gain confidence.  I built my brand, wrote blogs and taped video blogs. I teamed up with the Silent Partner Marketing and worked with an energetic team of confident people. For once in my life, I began to think that I’m really good at what I do. As I garnered media placement after media placement, my confidence began to build.

I put 110% into my work and logged extremely long hours. One October day, I reached out to a producer at the Dr.Oz show, not expecting to EVER hear back. Well, I did. The producer and I had a great conversation and she was interested in hearing my pitch. The night before the show, I reached out to my producer on my contact list at MSNBC to pitch another client and myself. Again, it’s VERY rare to hear back from them. Long story short, we met and my client was on Your Business with JJ Ramberg a month later. As I was sitting in the green room at Dr.Oz and MSNBC, I looked around and thought to myself, I did this. I got us here. Heck, I ‘m really good at what I do. Two years ago those words would never have come out of my mouth. It’s amazing what a little network television will do to you.

Public Relations is all about pitching and persistence. If you continue to do it right, you will be successful. Life is also about pitching and persistence. We must pitch ourselves. We must look in the mirror and tell ourselves that we are good at what we do. We are beautiful. We are great moms and dads. We are wonderful bosses and employees.  We must be focused on our goals and dreams.

I make sacrifices…a lot of them. But, I am a much different person than I was before starting my company. The new Alison believes that she can and will do anything that she puts her mind to. So buckle up Alison May Public Relations clients, get ready for big things in 2016.

Was there a moment in your life that changed the way you thought about things, personally or professionally? I would love to hear about it.