Lizzie Velasquez

God made me the way I am for a reason and I would never change that. I lead a normal life as much as possible and deal with the bumps in the road as they come along with my head held high and a smile on my face!

Young girls and boys from all around the world let me know their personal story, and I can feel their smile through their words. To be able to look at those comments and just get encouragement from them and know that I am living the life that I'm supposed to is what keeps me going every day.

I credit a lot of learning to love myself to my faith, my family and my friends. Everyone needs someone you can look to for constant support, who you never have to impress, to share your happy and sad days.

I feel like I've built up this persona of always being positive and always being happy, and I worried if my audience sees me not in that light, will they think less of me? Will they discredit me? Will I just be nothing?

I told myself that I wanted to be a motivational speaker, I wanted to write a book, graduate college, have my own family, and have my own career.

I taught myself how to be a speaker on Google. I just Googled 'how to be a motivational speaker.'

You don't have to live up to anyone else's standards, you don't have to look like anyone else, you don't have to compare yourself to anyone else. You being you is enough, and you putting your positivity and good vibes out into the world, once you get to that point absolutely everything will fall into place.

I normally don't ever talk about my dating life or anything super personal in the press just because I feel like there's this fine line between what to keep to myself and what to share.

My biggest piece of advice when it comes to bullying is to have an open communication about it.

Bullying needs to have more attention, and there needs to be more open communication in schools to make kids feel comfortable enough to speak up.