I wouldn't be here without my friends.

I didn’t realize how much of my life was carried by other people until I looked back one day and saw their footprints beside mine. Not behind me. Beside me. Always.

It started in high school, before I had words for anything I was feeling. I joined the football team because I thought that was what you were supposed to do. What I didn’t expect was to find a group of people who taught me what it meant to give more than you think you have. Early mornings where the sky was still a dull gray. Practices so cold your breath felt like smoke. Those boys didn’t care if I doubted myself. They cared if I showed up. And in showing up, I learned the first real thing about work. That grit isn’t loud. It’s quiet. It’s the decisions no one sees.

A few years later, I found myself building something I never imagined. School Simplified. I was just a kid with a laptop and too many responsibilities at home, trying to make sense of life while helping other students do the same. I wasn’t alone. Ethan, Annchine, Makayla, Nicole, Paul. All of us stumbling our way through leadership, community, and service. There were nights where we stayed up until the sun rose, nights where we wanted to quit, nights where the only thing keeping the project alive was the belief we held for each other.

That was the first time I learned what it felt like to impact strangers around the world, and yet be held together by a small group of friends whose names most people would never hear. They were the ones who kept me grounded when everything around me felt bigger than I knew how to handle.

Then there was college. Bentley. A new chapter, but the same search for a place to belong. BASA became that place. Not because of the events or the titles, but because of the people who showed up day after day. The ones who stayed up with me planning cultural nights until we were delirious. The ones who ran across campus with me five minutes before showtime because something went wrong, again. The ones who laughed with me at midnight over food we definitely didn’t need, and who listened quietly when life got heavy.

Those friendships didn’t just help me survive college. They shaped who I became. They taught me that belonging is not something you find. It’s something you build together.

As I got deeper into entrepreneurship, I met people who changed the way I saw possibility. People like Mo and Coop, who didn’t just push me. They looked me in the eye and told me I was capable of something larger. Hearing that at the right moment can change a life. It changed mine. It shifted my ambition from something private to something alive.

And then there was Bill. A mentor who taught me that boldness is a choice. He didn’t lecture me. He didn’t soften the truth. He simply spoke to me like someone who expected me to rise to the challenge. In every conversation, he handed me a version of myself that was sharper, more confident, more intentional. A version I wanted to grow into.

Startup life only widened the circle. What began as a few coffee chats in Boston and some cold DMs sent at two in the morning became friendships that showed me the world was bigger than I knew. Creators who taught me to use my voice. Founders who exposed me to resilience I didn’t know existed. People who didn’t owe me anything, yet believed in me anyway. Those small, quiet acts of kindness gave me a place in a world I always thought was too far away.

Somewhere along the way, I realized something simple. My story was never really mine alone. Every step I took was pushed forward by the people around me. Friends who stood beside me when things were heavy. Teammates who taught me discipline before I had any. Mentors who stretched my world until I could see past my doubts.

And now, when I move through life, I carry all of them with me. Not as memories, but as reasons. Reasons to be better. Reasons to keep going. Reasons to believe in myself.

I owe a lot of who I am to the people who walked with me. And I don’t take that lightly.

If there is anything true about my journey, it is this: I did not get here alone. I got here because someone cared enough to walk beside me.