NavyDEP - Dear Future Shipmate - (This is a great letter)

This letter was written by a female sailor (Glitter Bomb) who just finished bootcamp. I found this letter to be outstanding.

Dear Future Shipmate:

I am 18yrs old and I shipped out to bootcamp July 27, I PIR’d on September 17th. I wanted to write some words of inspiration to help get you through these next few weeks! So here it goes...

Don't ever let circumstances, events, or other people tell you, you can't do something. You can, and you are very capable. You deserve to experience a life of joy, freedom, and completeness. Just don't give up. There will be times along your journey that you will be faced with extreme obstacles and setbacks (and really, who hasn’t come across those once or twice in their life?). They will make you reconsider your ability to accomplish your dreams, they will make you come up with excuses to procrastinate, and they will make you feel hopeless, powerless, lost, confused and frustrated. It’s the times like these when you find out what you're really made of, and just how much you can take before you are ready to break down. These are the moments you will find out just how much you are worth and how strong you really are. These are the times when your character is built, and your destiny unravels. What you choose to focus on when things get tough will determine everything. It won't be easy, if it were, they wouldn't be called obstacles, and they wouldn't force you to grow. Remaining focused and determined isn't an easy task. It's easy to be side tracked, and how you react to failure will determine your success in life. You should be glad it isn’t easy, you learn a lot more from harder times than you do from the easier times, trust me.

Live your life carefree, but also carefully. Take the punches life throws, and hit back with a right hook. Promise yourself to be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind. Promise yourself to talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet, and to make all your friends feel like there is something special within them. Promise yourself to look at the sunny side of everything and to let your optimism shine through. Promise yourself to think only of the best, to work only for the best, and to expect only the best. Promise yourself to be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own, and to forget the mistakes of the past and press on the greater achievements of the future. Promise yourself to wear a cheerful expression at all times and give every living person you meet a smile, and to give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others. Promise yourself to be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and to happy to allow the subtle presence of trouble emerge. Make these promises to yourself, and your life will be full of happiness!

Although I do not know you on a personal level, I care about you a lot and wish only the best for you. May you have enough happiness to keep you sweet, plenty of hope to keep you happy, and enough success to keep you eager. May you always have enough friends to give you comfort and plenty of wealth to meet your needs. May you have enough enthusiasm to look forward and enough determination to make each day better than the last.

If you don’t take anything from this letter, at least take this to heart...Lifes challenges are not supposed to paralyze you, they're supposed to help you discover who you are. Use them, embrace them, take what you need from them and move on to bigger and better things. You are on a great path in life and are set up to do many great things. Stay focused and determined and everything else will fall into place. I truly believe that everything happens for a reason...

Bootcamp may seem hard as times, but in the end you will grow into something even better than you were before. It will all be worth it in the end! Good luck shipmate! I can not wait to see you in the fleet! =) I look forward to serving this beautiful country with you!

Future Fellow Shipmate