"Susan Boyle dreamed of being a professional singer since she was 12. She's now 47 and lives in a small village in Scotland. Last weekend she appeared on Britain's Got Talent, where her performance....well, check it out here. Please.

Listen to her beautiful voice, and then think about what that moment meant. For 35 years, Susan Boyle dreamed about it. She faced enormous struggles and roadblocks, but did not let them derail her completely. She sang in her church choir and at karaoke nights, continuing to develop her voice, and then she stepped out. She signed up for the show and in a matter of minutes has taken the world by storm. 

What strikes me when I watch the video (and I've watched it several times over the past few days), it's that while her voice is truly breathtaking, it's not those few minutes onstage that tell her story. It's 35 years of dreaming, 35 years of never giving up, 35 years of judging herself by what she had on the inside, not how she looked on the outside, that make her performance not just beautiful, but heroic.

In my eyes, anyway.

I believe that each of us has the power to achieve our dreams...or some measure of them, anyway. If we step away from the mirror and lookinside ourselves, we can find our strengths, our tenacity, and our courage, and we can succeed."