From the Front Porch
I had an award sitting in a box for a year.
Not because I forgot about it. Not because it didn't matter. Because some part of me believed that displaying it would be arrogant. Like I was bragging. Like I hadn't really earned the right to celebrate.
So it sat there. Collecting dust. Hidden.
Then the SaaSprenuer Gold came. Different award, same old script starting to play in my head. But this time, I did something I hadn't done before.
I opened it in front of the team.
I watched their faces. The excitement. The pride. They weren't thinking about whether I deserved it. They were celebrating the work... the late nights, the hundreds of user calls, the hours of coding, the doing-more-than-most that nobody else saw. They remembered the grind even when I was trying to minimize it.
And something cracked open.
I stood there holding this award, watching people celebrate a win I was about to shove in another box, and I thought...
What the hell am I doing?
But even then, the voice didn't shut up.
Who are you to display this? You think one award makes you somebody? Other people have shelves full of these. You got lucky. Don't be that guy... the one who needs everyone to see his trophies.
My chest tightened. I smiled at the team, thanked them, and quietly set the award on my desk like it was temporary. Like I was still deciding. But really, I was negotiating with a version of myself that had been running the show for years. The one who believed celebrating meant you'd stopped being hungry. That pride was the first step toward becoming soft. Comfortable. Irrelevant.
I recall grinding for years in the dark with that voice as my constant companion. Trying to keep up with people I didn't even know. Measuring myself against their highlight reels. Wondering why they seemed to have more when I was pouring out just as much, if not more. The answer was brutal when I finally saw it: I wasn't behind. I was just running a race I never agreed to enter. Chasing ghosts toward a finish line that didn't exist, because I never stopped long enough to ask what winning actually meant for me.
You ever done that? Hustled so hard for something you couldn't even define? Waited for some moment of arrival that kept moving further away?
I had a guy reach out recently. Drowning in doubt, feeling lost, convinced he was missing some secret ingredient to "real" success. And I asked him the question nobody had asked me when I was in that place: "Who told you what 'real success' looks like?"
He went quiet.
Because the answer is almost always the same. Someone else. Some image. Some scoreboard we inherited without ever questioning whether it was ours to carry.
That award sits on my shelf now. Not for anyone else. For me. A reminder that I spent too many years waiting for permission that was never coming. Permission to celebrate. Permission to own what I built. Permission to stop chasing and start living.
The team's excitement broke the tie that day.
Here's what I know now...
I shouldn't have needed it. The permission was always mine to give.
What about you? What win have you shoved in a box because you didn't think you'd earned the right to celebrate it?
A Hard Truth
There's a lie you've been swallowing: You're not successful yet because you're missing something.
Screw that.
You're not missing anything. You've just been measuring your life on a scoreboard you didn't build. Someone else's metrics. Someone else's milestones. Someone else's definition of "making it."
And you know what happens when you play by someone else's rules? You win their game and lose your life.
I did it for years. Grinding toward a finish line that kept moving. Collecting wins I wouldn't let myself feel. Waiting for some voice outside my head to say "Okay, now you can be proud."
That voice never showed up.
Nobody is coming to tell you that you've made it. No one's going to tap you on the shoulder and say "You can stop proving yourself now." That moment you're waiting for? It's not delayed. It doesn't exist.
You either decide you're enough, or you die chasing a ghost.
Today's Shift
The Permission Shift
Most of us were taught to wait. Wait for the promotion. Wait for the recognition. Wait for someone to say "you've earned it." We built our entire definition of success around external validation, and then wondered why we felt empty when it didn't come.
The Permission Shift breaks that cycle. It's not complicated, but it requires honesty.
Step 1: Recognize you've been waiting.
Where in your life are you still waiting for someone else to validate what you already know? The job. The business. The relationship. The goal you hit that you brushed past without stopping. Name it.
Step 2: Identify whose scoreboard you've been using.
Whose metrics have you inherited? A parent's definition of stability? An industry's idea of success? Social media's highlight reel? You can't build your own scoreboard until you see the one you've been borrowing.
Step 3: Define success on your terms.
Not the polished version. The real one. What does winning actually look like for YOUR life? Write it down. Make it specific.
Step 4: Celebrate what you've dismissed.
That win you brushed off? The one you told yourself didn't count? It counts. Celebrate it today, not when you feel ready, not when it's bigger. Now.
Where have you been waiting for permission that was always yours to give?
By the Numbers
The cost of waiting:
- 73% of professionals report feeling "unfulfilled" despite hitting traditional success markers.
- The average person spends 15+ years chasing goals they inherited from someone else before questioning them.
- People who define success on their own terms report 47% higher life satisfaction. Not because they achieve more, but because they actually feel what they achieve.
The shift in practice:
- It takes less than 10 minutes to write your own definition of success. Most never do it.
- Celebrating small wins increases follow-through on bigger goals by 33%
- One permission slip — the one you give yourself — changes everything. Zero external validation required.
The math isn't complicated. The delay is.
A Story
I remember a guy who built his business from nothing. Scraped together clients one by one. Worked nights after his day job until he could finally quit. Hit six figures.
And you know what he did? Nothing. No pause. No celebration. Just immediately started comparing himself to the guy doing seven.
The goalpost moved before he even caught his breath.
One night his kid asked him, "Dad, are you happy?"
He told me he stood there, mouth open, and couldn't find an answer. Not because he wasn't successful, by most standards, he'd made it. But he'd never let himself feel it. He was too busy chasing the next number, the next milestone, the next version of "enough" that kept floating just out of reach.
That question from his kid broke something open. Not because the kid understood business. Because the kid saw what he couldn't... that he was winning a game he wasn't even enjoying.
Sometimes it takes a seven-year-old to see what we've been hiding from ourselves.
Tools for the Week
This week, you get three tools to put The Permission Shift into practice:**
1. The Scoreboard Audit
Before you can build your own scoreboard, you have to see the one you've been borrowing. This worksheet walks you through identifying whose metrics you've been chasing... parents, industry, social media, whoever. You can't rewrite the rules until you see the ones running your life.
2. The Win Inventory
A simple exercise to surface the wins you've been dismissing. The milestones you hit and brushed past. The goals you reached and immediately replaced with bigger ones. This isn't about bragging... it's about seeing what you've been refusing to feel.
3. The Permission List
The things you've been waiting to do, celebrate, or own... but haven't because you were waiting for someone else to say it was okay. Write them down. Then give yourself the permission you've been outsourcing.
These aren't optional extras. They're the work.
Which one are you avoiding.. and why?
What's Coming Next
This week we go deeper.
Today laid the foundation, The Permission Shift. Recognizing you've been waiting for validation that was never coming.
Wednesday, we tackle the Scoreboard Audit and the Win Inventory. Where did your definition of success actually come from, and what wins have you buried because of it?
Friday, we bring it home with the Permission List. What have you been holding back? And what changes when you stop outsourcing your "enoughness" (yes, that is a word. SO WHAT if I made it up) to people who were never paying attention anyway?
The tools are ready. The question is... are you willing to use them?
Share The Collective
Know someone running on a scoreboard they didn't build? Someone grinding toward a finish line that keeps moving?
Forward this to them.
Not because they need fixing. Because sometimes it helps to know you're not the only one who's been chasing ghosts. And maybe they're ready to stop.
The Permission Shift starts with one choice. Pass it on.
Closing Thought
You don't need anyone's permission to celebrate what you've built.
You never did.
— Damien
