On Thursday, Time magazine released its 100 Most Influential People in the World list for 2017 [1], and of course it includes Ed Sheeran. The "Supermarket Flowers" [2] singer has had an amazing year so far, which has included him releasing his hit album Divide [3], killing every performance [4] he puts on, and opening up about his personal life [5] with girlfriend Cherry Seaborn. Ed's longtime close friend Taylor Swift [6] wrote a touching essay [7] about his career for the magazine, calling him a "tank" for his ambitions and sharing a personal story about a moment of doubt he once had about being successful.

"A few years ago, in a rare moment of admitting feeling defeated, Ed said to me, 'I'm never going to win a Grammy.' Yes, you are, I said. You're going to sweep the whole thing one of these years. It was a few weeks later when he met me in a dance-shoe store in London, where I was picking out rehearsal outfits, and said, 'You have to hear this.' It was a song he'd just finished called 'Thinking Out Loud,' which went on to win Song of the Year at the Grammy Awards in 2016." She ended her excerpt with a lovely note, writing, "Congratulations to my friend Ed, for the legacy you've already built and the brilliant hook you probably just came up with five minutes ago."