Daily Motivations - OVERCOME NEGATIVE THOUGHTS

Episode Date: July 19, 2022

5 positive attitude quotes to stop negative thoughts “It takes but one positive thought when given a chance to survive and thrive to overpower an entire army of negative thoughts.” Robert H. Schuller “You know what's just as powerful as a good cup of coffee in the morning? Start your day with some good, loving thoughts. It can change how your whole day unfolds.” Karen Salmansohn “An attitude of positive expectation is the mark of the superior personality.” Brian Tracy “Hard work is good for the soul, and it keeps you from feeling sorry for yourself because you don’t have time.” Dave Thomas “Feeling sad or lonely isn't a bad thing. But those emotions increase the risk that you'll cross the line into self-pity.” Amy Morin Instagram - @daily_motivationsorg     Facebook- @daily_motivationsorg Interested in sponsoring this show reach out to us via [e-mail] Speaker: @Eddie Pinero Grab your Ultimate Female Body Fitness Guide Ebook  copy now at an exclusive 50% off discount  https://selar.co/42zb40?currency=USD Kindly Support Us Below to sustain future episodes. Support the Show.

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Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BidMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Why is it that the average person seeks out the advice of what feels like a million people before consulting himself? Knocking, looking, hoping. Is he looking for answers? Or looking for permission to be who he already knows he is? Is he looking for insight?

Or just validation that his reflection is in fact okay? See, I think we all deep down know who we are, know what drives us. And even if we don't know exactly what the destination looks like, our hearts know the direction best suited to begin the pursuit. So how is it so easy to forget? Why do we get our antennas crossed? See, when life becomes about meeting requirements and fulfilling obligations, checking off boxes and checking in on time, we forget the basics. We forget to live for ourselves. As if our job is to play a part, not direct the movie. And playing a part is living up to expectations. Directing the movie, well, that's creating your own expectations. This world, your world, it belongs to you. It's a world with both unimaginable happiness, bliss, moments of

ecstasy, and the occasional suffering, chaos that we have to navigate through. But I think all of it comes down to whether you trust yourself to live it for yourself. To remove the shackles, take the training wheels off, stop asking permission, and do what you've always known was the right thing. That part never changed. It just had to wait amidst all your looking for external direction for you to pause and find the internal courage. Freedom is not a life without chaos. It's trusting yourself to determine which dragons you will slay. It's not a life without battles, but fighting those battles that result in your liberation, dismissing the oppressors that build fences in your mind and chains around your soul. I've thought a lot about the idea of a life well-lived,

what it means, how it feels, and it seems to me it's about intentionality. Where are you going? It's not that you can escape suffering or eliminate fear. It's not that you'll avoid getting lost along the way, but it's the why. Why we endure these things makes all the difference. Is it for a better tomorrow or simply to get through today? And it's amazing. Accidentally stumbling upon that which scares you and intentionally facing that which scares you are so different that their occurrences trigger completely different neural networks in the brain. See, overcoming fear is ingrained in us. We want to grow. We want to evolve.

We need more. The question is whether you will step out of the line that someone else made for you and live a life that is your own. And if it's crazy, great. Let it be crazy. If it's unique, perfect. Stand out. And if it scares you, my God, if it scares you, don't turn back. Don't you dare turn back. Give yourself the most important permission one can give, the permission to follow your intuition and your curiosity into tomorrow. Let the stakes be higher, but the rewards be meaningful. Let the chaos be your own to tame and to master. Every twist, every turn becomes not only a part of you, but a chapter in the story of your becoming. And as the seed you've held in your hand for so long finally meets the earth and grows so high that it connects you to the heavens.

Remember that this is your life. It's your obligation to live it fully. Welcome to Daily Motivation, where you get motivated and inspired. Why is it that when we look back on our lives, it's never the easy days or the simplicity? It's not the calm that changes our reality or makes us who we are. Don't get me wrong, calm and simplicity, they're wonderful, but they're not transformative. And why would they be? Why would we change or seek to obtain more without a reason or incentive?

It's times of struggle, of turbulence. It's when life was hard that we had to rethink who we are, reshape the way we look at the world. Because without chaos, you don't get calm. Without the storm, you don't get those crazy neon colors and golden rays it leaves as it passes by. In order to triumph in any capacity or any area of life, there is always a sacrifice that must be made. The adversity is the fire that forges the iron. There's a saying, hard times create strong men. Strong men create good

times. Good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times. It's a cycle. And this is generally used in a socio-political sense, and I think in a lot of ways it applies today. But where I've really found it useful, where I've found value in it, is at the personal level. Because what I've noticed is that growth also appears to have a cyclical nature. And when we're in a rough situation or overcoming an obstacle, we have to push, we fight, we grow. Sometimes without even realizing it, we achieve a result. And by default, this transformation that in one way or another makes us something new. But then it becomes easy to level out, right? And that's the challenge. It creates this period

of stagnation. It's like we made the jump and it becomes real easy to stay there. And that's why I have found value in when life is not providing resistance to manufacture some, because that's the only way to grow. Progress is happiness. Viktor Frankl and man's search for meaning, you know, he says purpose is to find from struggle. If things are too calm or simple or quiet, life begins to lack meaning, and that's never a spot we want to be. Life is about the pursuit of something. You just have to figure out what that blank will be. You get to decide which mountain to climb.

There's a story about a butterfly making its way out of a cocoon, and it makes a little hole. It starts attempting butterfly making its way out of a cocoon. And it makes a little hole. It starts attempting to push its way out. Someone walks by. They see it struggling and open the cocoon up to help the butterfly out, right? Thinking that they did this great deed. But in doing so, that butterfly has now lost its ability to use its wings to fly. Why? Because the strength that was necessary to fly

would have been forged when he fought his way out. The butterfly was deprived of the very thing it needed to become something more, and that's the point. It's easy to get lost in the now and seek to eliminate everything that doesn't make the moment more comfortable, to remove that which doesn't make things easier. But whether we're talking about collectively or the complacency in our individual lives, we have to remember that avoiding discomfort isn't the answer.

When your biggest problem is Amazon taking five days to deliver or that your feelings are hurt by someone's comments or opinions on social media, you've lost track of yourself. You may be living in a world lacking the resistance necessary for growth. Maybe it's time to ask what matters. And I remember when I lived in Boston, I'd walk around listening to podcasts downtown. And I'll never forget hearing Ryan Holiday differentiating between passion and purpose. He called passion temporary, a dopamine hit. It's the excitement before the project begins, the beginning of a journey, the honeymoon fate. But passion alone falls short. And it falls short because anything worthwhile is hard. It tests us.

It repeatedly presents us with those metaphorical cocoons we have to fight. We have to earn our stripes, grow our wings, and if we stop at passion, there's no reason to battle on. To take the punches, knowing that they will create for us a tomorrow full of infinite possibility. And that's where we need purpose. That's why it matters. We need something bigger to march towards. A destination that's meaningful. To remind us that those challenging times, they're not a burden. There is no poor me here. They're the fire that sharpens us.

That whispers to us not only the importance of carrying on, but the power contained within ourselves to do so. This world, it is not stacked against you. It's never the problem or the obstacle. No, it's the opportunity laid out at your feet. And it's in those very times when we're uncomfortable, when we're unsure, when we don't know where to draw our strength that we need to remember it comes within.

It's an idea that is brought to life through courage, through understanding, through the trials and tribulations of life that didn't intimidate or hold you back, knowing that life has given you everything you need to blaze your trail. So don't be afraid to let it take you somewhere new. Stay with us. We'll be right back. discount. This comprehensive resource is designed specifically for women aiming to conquer their fitness goals. From strength training to cardio, flexibility, nutrition, and mindset, we've got you covered. Inside, you'll find expertly crafted workout routines, personalized meal plans,

motivation tips, and strategies tailored to help you reach your fitness dreams. We also tackle common challenges women encounter on their fitness journeys, offering advice on balancing exercise with life's demands and breaking free from societal norms. Don't miss out on this incredible deal of 50% off. Get your ebook now before it's too late. I've come to accept the fact that I'm a loser. The more people say otherwise, the more I prove over and over again that it's just who I am. Stuck in my ways, an outsider, outcast, out of my mind, loser. See, it started with my old identity, who I used to be. I lost that. Then I lost those people that made me feel small, the ones holding me back.

Bye. Would the streak continue? You bet. Lost that need to please others. Hey, turns out I know what's best for me better than they do. Lost the things being done out of obligation and not purpose. Lost the wrong metrics I was using to measure success. Gone. Lost my way so that was using to measure success. Gone.

Lost my way so that I might find something better. That was hard. Thought I might lose my mind, but I found it. Just lost my old way of thinking, and hey, that's a win. Lost yesterday. Found tomorrow. Lost scarcity, but found abundance. I lost to the people who were more talented, better skilled, the ones who outclassed me fine. Showed me what it took to win. I lost my heart a few times, that sucked, but looks like it still works, so we're good. I lost my purpose, followed the shiny objects instead of the things that matter, but sometimes seeing what doesn't shine puts a spotlight on what does.

Keeps me swinging from star to star. Yeah, I like it up here. I lose my discipline from time to time, but hey, regret hurts more, so I force myself to find it. As I write this out, speak it into existence, I'm losing track of time. All is forgotten. But I think that's how it should be. I hope I lose more tomorrow. Yeah, I lose a lot.

Thank God. A hope. Hope. That bridge that connects the present to a more ideal world. The idea that no obstacle is too big to overcome. No situation too dire to emerge victorious. And that you are never confined to how things are. FDR has said, we have always held to hope, the belief, the conviction that there is a better life, a better world beyond the horizon. Why does this matter? Well, to put it simply, before one can leave the situation they are in, they have to believe there is another path worth taking.

It's not always seeing, but trusting. It's a tale of two components. One, the belief that something better is out there. And two, the belief that you are strong enough to bridge that gap to create that world. So let's start with number one. There was a study done by Kurt Richter in the 1950s, and he used rats.

And it was kind of a gruesome experiment, but definitely worth talking about because the takeaway is incredible, right? And I kind of cherry-picked the relevant parts of the experiment. Basically, he wanted to delve into the role that hope plays in our lives. And what he would do is he would drop rats into a jar of water and observe. See how long they would swim before they drown. And for the most part, these rats would swim for a minute or two and then ultimately give up. There was this innate feeling of hopelessness. But then he made a change and when they were close to drowning, he'd reach in, he'd pick them up, he'd hold them for a

little while. And then he'd place them back in the water and the results between the two groups were night and day. The rats saw in the second group that it wasn't over. And when they were placed back in the water, they had a reason to continue swimming and they did. Some of them did for hours. The only difference being that they had hope. They saw there was more. And I don't think that's too different from us. The situation may be different, but the rules generally apply, right?

So much of conceding or giving up in life, accepting an existence that falls short of our ideals, is when we don't believe in something more. We stop swimming. We don't give ourselves a chance. So instead of creating bridges to walk on, we make walls that lock us in. Hope is knowing all pain, all discomfort is temporary.

And the second component is belief in yourself. Belief in yourself to traverse that space between current and the ideal. It's self-empowerment. You can be the difference maker in your life and others. And it's funny, the other day, after reading about the Richter experiment, I was sitting at a friend's house with my laptop,

kind of trying to figure out what to make of it, because the idea of hope I knew was powerful, and I wanted to share that story, I wanted to write something that would highlight its value, but it seemed kind of unfinished, or simply part of an explanation. I'm sitting there thinking about it. And I hear this loud bang over and over again. And I get up and I run to the back of the house, right, to make sure

everything's fine, see what's going on. And my friend's standing there with goggles on, this grin on his face and a sledgehammer. And a huge hole in the wall in front of him. And I'm like, dude, what are you doing? You just knocked your wall down. He goes, yeah, I wanted to make another closet. His family's growing. He needs more space. And he just took it upon himself to make that happen. I just looked at him and walked back out, started walking to the living room and it hit me. This is a component of hope. Seeing what's not there and doing something about it. If the swimming experiment is step one, this has to be step two. In real time. Step one, believing, seeing something more.

Step two, taking action to change it now. Buying into the fact that you have the power to change your own world. And it's funny because any house or room I've ever lived in, my thoughts always, you know, you look around and this is it, right? This is the situation. This is what's being given to me. How do I make the most of it? How do I play within these parameters? Not, okay, this is fine, but it could be better, you know, by smashing down the wall in the back over there, creating something new. And, you know, obviously the message here isn't about home

maintenance, right? This is about taking a sledgehammer to the places in your life in which you are not content so that you can build in its place something that matters. You look around to your left, to your right, and you're unhappy. That's not the end of the story. That's the beginning of the story. That's where the wheels hit the road. In other words, it's looking at life with the lens, with the freedom of knowing

things don't have to be what they are. They don't have to stay the same until the universe changes them. No, they can be what they are. They don't have to stay the same until the universe changes them. No, they can be what you make them. And what life teaches us again and again is that walls can be stepped over. No's can become yes's. Impossibles can become commonplace. But first, there must be hope

There must be an understanding that your world Is a 10,000 foot view of all the little stories you tell yourself And the narratives you believe See, every day when you wake up and take your first steps, breathe your first breaths, know that nothing simply is. No, it is simply chosen and can be remade. That's what makes life such a beautiful thing. It's flexibility. It's promise to provide what has been relentlessly sought out. So remember, it's when you can't find your answer, when the odds look grim, when the rest of the world tells you no, that you most need hope. Hope, the power,

the strength to look within yourself and remember that one, life can change, and two, you can change it. Armed with this understanding, nothing is impossible. When others fail to see the answer, the light in themselves, in the situation, you become the reminder that light is internally manufactured. We aren't given answers so that we may believe them. We are given the opportunity to believe and thus we create that ending we hope to pursue. And without this, life is nothing more than a permanent status quo. It's holding our hands to the sky and receiving what light chooses to provide. But that's not why you're here. It's not why you woke up today.

Not to accept, but to create. To find hope in the tragedy and the hardship and to find within yourself the strength to move forward with whatever you decide comes next. There's a saying that some people feel the rain, others just get wet. I've always found this interesting, this idea how the same subject, same situation, or occurrence can be interpreted so differently. It can plant the seeds for such different outcomes. Like Yashimi and Koga mention in their book, The Courage to be Disliked, well water is 60 degrees, and it's always 60 degrees in the summer and the winter. But depending on what time of year, the makeup of the outside world, that 60 degrees feels different.

The water didn't change, its circumstances did, and our thoughts are no different. It's not the world that writes the story, we do. And every second, moment, day is merely an interpretation. Does time tick by? Or is it driven into a state of flow is it transformed into something more was losing an indicator that hey maybe you're not good enough or is it your motivation to be better than you've ever been is your day an allegiance to the present or an invitation to chase down tomorrow. See, the world doesn't get to tell the tale. The world is paper. It's ink. It's ideas.

The world is everything you need to decide how your story's going to go. How does he see the world? How does she define reality? That's the question. Because you don't need to change the world, you need to change the way you see it. And you don't need to change who you are. You need to change the imaginary shackles you've placed around your ankles that are limiting the heights you could reach. In fact, the world, as far as I'm concerned, is an accumulation of thoughts,

ideas. It's 8 billion individualized movie screens attempting to interact, to coexist together. And when you look at it like that, it's not that your mindset plays a role or it's kind of important. No, it's that it narrates the play. It's the glue that ties everything together. What you see is what you get. And this isn't a one and done thing. It's an everyday thing. Because there's always going to be occurrences in our lives that challenge us, that threaten our understanding of who we are and what we're capable of.

There will always be the temptation to make the opportunity into the problem and the hero into the villain. But why forfeit that control? I remember hearing that if you find time to be grateful, both in the morning and at night, it changes your life. Not because the world transforms, but because it reinforces the perspective you need. We are lucky to be here. We're lucky to have challenges that push us forward. Lucky to have ups and downs that bring us closer to the people in our lives. We're lucky that chaos and discomfort open a door for transformation on the other side. And look, I get life isn't perfect and not everything can be great all the time. But I do believe that if we can bring ourselves to stop, to breathe, to even focus briefly,

we can find value in any situation. What's in front of you, it exists, right? It's the well water. You can't go back in time or remake the obstacle at your feet, but you can always decide how to make that work for you. And that's a superpower. And I use that. I use it when my short-term ideas or videos or projects underperform. I use it when people let me down. I use it when in the moment I'm either under or overwhelmed. The question,

where is the win? In this spot, this situation where most would hang their heads and let the outside world rewrite the story, how can I find a way to hold mine high and maintain my own accountability? Extreme differences in life outcomes are so often prompted by such subtle realizations, subtle decisions. Their reason to stop could be your reason to not only carry on, but thrive. And the best news is you don't need approval or authorization. You don't need the stars to align or doors to open up.

You just need to give yourself permission to see the sun amidst the clouds, the hope amidst the doubt. You have to remind yourself that there is always something to cling to, always a second chance, there is always a win. All you have to do is choose to see it. Would you ever wonder how much of you has materialized? Like if what F. Scott Fitzgerald says is true,

and our lives are defined by opportunity, even the ones we miss, then how much remains in the ether? And I don't think it's about playing a game of what if. You know that would be endless it would be self-defeating

no one's perfect. I don't even really think it's about making a right turn instead of a left because as long as you're moving and moving with conviction life ultimately brings you where you need to be. But more, my concern is the steps never brought to pavement.

My ideas unhatched. My opportunities I either knowingly or unknowingly left on the shelf. Because it didn't seem real enough. Like a Broadway play between my ears that as a spectator I knew would end. After all, that's what stories do. How much of ourselves have we cast aside as simply the things we don't say out loud? At first, it's infinite. We've yet to be taught to limit

because limits aren't things, they're ideas, and ideas must be adopted. That's why they say some of life's best things were done by people too ignorant to know they were impossible, too naive of the notion that they couldn't say them out loud. Then it's comparison.

They have what I want, but it was meant for them and not me. How delusional to think I could have it. How crazy to think that life has yet to be written and I am an author. My date is with normalcy in the box where I keep those things we don't say out loud. And then we look around and we see highlight reels. We see awards and vacations and smiles, but we don't stop to think maybe they're just like me. Maybe they're people who struggle and question themselves and doubt the road ahead. No, it must be the past diverged. They took happiness and I took those things we don't say out loud. And then there's everyday life when things don't go as planned, when the world presents curve balls and you haven't learned

to hit off speed. So you feel small and you feel inadequate and ill-equipped and you could reach out, but that's not cool. That's not right That's something that you don't say out loud But we keep it in like all in and eventually becomes the if only's and I wish I had it's the quiet envy gazing Longingly towards those who just cared less who realized maybe life's not as serious as we make it out to be who turn thoughts to Things not by burying but by embodying them. And maybe that's the trick, to unlock the gate, keeping your perceived reality from the possibility of a new one, the one you could create if only you promoted your fleeting thoughts to forward

progress. See, dreams can fail to come to fruition in two places, in your head and outside of it. But at least outside, it has a chance. At least outside, you can take the common, normal, everyday background and make it the backdrop to your movie, where you play a lead role. But it must be accepted and acknowledged, not thought of or even whispered, but screened so that the details

and the trivialities that exist now work for you. That's right, they are now yours. Not because you thought about it, but because you reached out a hand and you took, you asked the world for something. And in life, it will always be true that you don't get what you do not ask for.

So when you find yourself staring up a wall comprised of self-defeating narratives and manufactured limits, be ignorant, be irrational, be the reason your dreams have a chance. And when you look around and you see more and wonder why you don't have it, know that you can, you're allowed to. If you sacrifice, you will, but you must believe that you don't have it. Know that you can, you're allowed to, if you sacrifice

you will, but you must believe you are worthy of it. Not in the back of your head where you keep your locker combo and movie quotes, but in reality where words bounce off lips. And when you feel like life is treating you unfairly, like they're happier or have it better, know that life is peaks and valleys, not just for you but for everyone and how you internalize that and carry on makes the difference and when you feel lost or stuck you are not hopeless but in progress being broken down so that you can be reconstructed stronger better victory is not in hiding those struggles, but accepting them as the difference,

as the reason you created the miraculous. Not because you had dreams, but because you said them out loud. Life's best kept secret? Simple. Show up. Show up when you're tired. You're down. Show up after defeat.

Show up when you're stressed, when you're worried Show up when you don't feel like it In fact, that's when it's most important to show up That becomes the great differentiator See, a lot of us, somewhere along the way, we adopt this idea that winning is about the home run. It's stepping up to the plate and swinging so hard that the ball leaves the park and it never comes back to earth. And while, yeah, that's a fantastic sentiment, and if or when that happens, that's great.

But sustained success isn't one monumental occurrence. It's little victories consistently occurring over and over and over. Very small. In fact, to those walking by, they're probably too ordinary to be considered successful or acknowledged. They're too mundane. They're only victories because you decided they are. And when you think about it, the evidence is out there.

Right? Successful teams don't build game plans around the Hail Mary with no time left on the clock. No, they show up every day and master the task in front of them. They compound the opportunity available on a daily basis because it's there, and that puts them in a position to execute. However the situation unfolds, they showed up when it quote-unquote didn't matter, and that of course means everything when it does matter. And something I remind myself every day and something I think everyone should hear,

those waiting for life to hand out miracles will always be left behind by those willing to, well, show up. When it's not fun, not sexy or exciting, days when you're tired, when you're weak, when you feel like the weight of the world is on your shoulders because, well, we all know that happens. We all know how easy it is for that to be the excuse or become the free pass, especially when you know in the back of your head this is practice, right? This is a rep. The world won't end if you sit this one out. But if you wouldn't sit out the real thing,

the Super Bowl of your pursuit, then we have to understand the value of the mundane staircase leading to that event. And each seemingly insignificant step is your Super Bowl. It's not that it's close to the same, it has to be the same. It's the old saying, you play the way you practice, but turned way up. Now we're saying there is no difference. And when the lights are turned on and you're standing on that stage, it's not some new experience you have to figure out and navigate. It's the continuation of that staircase, of the old, of the familiar.

You showed up then and you'll show up now. When you were unsure of yourself then, you didn't hide. You trusted yourself, and now that same trust stands by your side. When you were tired, weak, when you had nine million things on your mind you didn't fail you blocked out the world and you found clarity and now that same clarity simplifies what lays before you when you felt discouraged or the finish line felt too far away you reacquired your meaning by simply executing by being there and now every part of you will execute here just the same so while it's their Super Bowl

their championship their one shot this is your everyday it's your DNA it's watching that ball roll down the hill that you created. Pushed by momentum you brought to life. You'll do what you came here to do. Because you made that decision. Every step along the way. Every single day leading up to now. Living is easy.

It's my inability to die that kills me. My hesitance to lock my old persona up and place it within the ship's cargo hold, watch it sail away to some far-off place. Maybe for a minute. Maybe forever. But the bird has to be uncaged.

It must unlearn its constraints. It must metaphorically die to transcend that which it knew itself to be. I think we all have wings. I think very few of us put them to use.

And isn't that the challenge? Perhaps we're too busy living. I've always had the ability. Now I've captured the fleeting awareness, next I must obtain the courage. Because the rule, the truth, the beacon of light to be followed

is we're always one decision away from a totally different life. If dare I decide to take the mask off that's been so effectively fooling others that I've begun to fool myself. Dare I decide to play new games with new rules to see life with new eyes, perhaps upside down. But when your sight is finally, finally set on infinity, when you're looking at the clouds while lying on your back, who's right, them or you? Who gets the honor of deciding?

And sometimes I wonder how far we need to walk to understand that the danger isn't stepping into a new pair of shoes. It's thinking you need to walk the same path down the same street in the same pair of shoes you've had on your entire life. Strange, right? Peculiar, according to previous cognitive mappings, but maybe they're crazy. Is your oxygen. Maybe crazy is pure. It's desirable. It's been the goal all along.

And while where I thought I dedicated my life to its pursuit, I see how wrong I was to think something new could emerge. No, not without the death of the old, not without that caricature of myself slipping away, not without that ship taking everything, every last thing. I want roots ripped from the ground. I want new heroes and new villains, new street signs telling of new roads, new tears from eyes stimulated by that which I've never seen, the increased rhythm of a new heartbeat, an anticipation of all that lies ahead. New beginnings, maybe for

a minute, or maybe forever. I'll let you know once I learn to die. There's a quote that states, life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it. Which means that your reaction is drastically more important than the circumstance. And that's critical to know. It's critical to understand that nothing, no one in life has more power over your own situation than you. And there's an old story that hits on this point exactly. There's a father and a daughter.

And basically the daughter's complaining. She's complaining about life, how difficult things are. She doesn't know how she's going to make it in whatever it is she's doing. I mean, the bottom line is she's tired of the day-to-day, right? And her father gets this idea. He says, come with me into the kitchen. And he gets three pots of water, puts them on the stove, and turns the burners on.

As soon as they start boiling, he drops a potato in the first one, an egg in the second one, and some coffee beans in the third one. And after some time goes by and they boil a little bit, he pulls them out, right? He puts the potato in a bowl. He puts the egg in a bowl and he takes a ladle and he puts some of the coffee in a cup. And he says, what do you see? She says, well, I see a potato, I see eggs and I see coffee. He says, yeah, but look closer.

There's more there. And she goes and she touches the potato and it's now soft. And he hands her the bowl with the boiled egg. And she takes the shell off and breaks it open. She sees that it's hard inside. Then finally he asks her to take a sip of the coffee. And, you know, she smells it. She takes a sip.

The smile comes to her face. She says, so what does all this mean? What are you trying to say? He says, well, the potato, when I dropped it in the water, it was rigid. It was tough. It was uncompromising. But in the boiling water, it became soft, weak. Then you had the egg that was basically the opposite.

This delicate layer protecting a liquid center, and the boiling water made it hard. And then there was the coffee. That wasn't just changed by the situation. It created something new. It took the same adversity and used it as a lever to bring something beautiful into existence. He then looks at his daughter and says, look, when things become challenging, when things become difficult, which one are you? What's your approach?

See, maybe the question is not about how challenging the situation is, right? Maybe we've been asking the wrong question. Maybe it's how do you transform yourself and by default, the world around you? How do you take your strengths, your values, your loves, your joys, your happiness, and let that lead you into something bigger? When life gets hard, and it does, what do you become? I always remind myself, you know, we are not defined by life at peak state. As much as I wish that were the case, right? We're not shaped by the easy days or the times that we floated by.

Because those times are great, they're enjoyable, but they're not what make or break us. It's the times that challenge us and ask us to be what we have not yet become. That's the good stuff. And this is another one of those, you know, simple but not easy type things, because on paper it makes sense. It's understood. But it's an outlook that manifests over time. It's slowly stacked piece by piece and brick by brick, realizing that every situation provides you with tools to make something out of an apparent nothing.

And then it waits, right? Because fate is in your hands. And I can certainly think of times in my life, that's one of the reasons I love these stories, I can reflect where each one of those pots of boiling water was relevant. I can think of times I was too headstrong, like the metaphorical potato, I thought success would be easy. I thought projects would be simple to

execute. I spent months doing things that just weren't good because I didn't ask what does the world need? I asked myself, what do I want to give the world? And there has to be a marriage there, right? And it was a quick reminder that the world owes me nothing. I was humbled or softened as the story goes. I've been the egg. I've been timid. I've been uncertain, thin-skinned, worrying about what people would say or the content I was creating, worried about perception. How would things look if I failed? And very quickly, I learned that when life is a game of comparison or one-upmanship,

when you do things for reasons and people other than yourself can't win, you overcompensate. You do things for the wrong reasons and you lose yourself. You become hardened. And then there's the good stuff, right? Getting to to the coffee not bowing down to the circumstances but shaping them not letting life dictate how the story goes or the fate of your character and what's interesting is i'm pretty sure that being that metaphorical egg and the potato they lay the foundation to become the coffee,

the life lessons, the falling down, the picking my ego up off the floor, learning to trust myself, not be led by the opinions and expectations of others. You essentially learn that you can take the world around you and change it, that it is malleable, it is flexible. You have that power.

You have that ability. It's up to you to believe it. And that's critical because no one comes along and cosigns that understanding for you. It's an internal process. You start to learn that things aren't there to provide instruction. They're there to propel you. But can you see the unknown as the opportunity,

the obstacle as the way, and the loss as the armor that you pick up during the journey? And so, you know, all of these words essentially come to one point. And that point is you have so much more control over your life than you think you do. As I've said before, you are stronger than you think you are. You are more resilient than you can even imagine.

And when life tests you, and again, it will, remember that the challenges are not happening to you, but for you. The world isn't taking away what you have. It's giving you what you need. So long as you're willing to adapt with it, to grow, expand out, because you not only have the ability to change yourself, but the world as well. Could it be that the answers to our most challenging questions are so small that they're brushed off as insignificant? That in pursuing that bulldozer we think is necessary to knock the door down, we refuse

again and again the key that would simply open it. Why is our first instinct to think our next action needs to be as big or as glamorous as that intended result. Again and again, my default has been to, you know, look for some brilliant monumental insight or some secret answer that would unroll like a scroll containing a treasure map. But again and again, I learn and I relearn that what I need, what is required is so reasonable. It's so accessible that it almost feels like the universe has a sense of humor, right? It's sitting back and chuckling while we run around with keys in our pockets looking for a sledgehammer to break

the door down. This is kind of a funny story. So last year, I had my first year rolled within live event. And Evan Carmichael was one of the speakers. And after the event, we were talking about YouTube, right? He says, Why don't you swing by, we'll look at your channel, we'll see if I can offer any suggestions or pointers. And, you know, I gladly accepted the offer. And so I showed up later in the evening. He's got his laptop open. He's running all these tests, right? There's graphs and there's charts and comparison tables.

And my first question is, obviously, what are you doing? And he says, I'm testing my YouTube titles and thumbnails. And I'm thinking, interesting. Here's a guy who makes so much content, he's got 378 million views. Why are you exhausting time and energy on this? So I asked him, Evan, does it really matter if your thumbnail picture is orange or yellow, or if there's a face on the left or right side, or if it's capitalized or not? If it's good, people will show up and they'll watch it. Isn't that what matters? Well, it turns out I was wrong. In fact, I couldn't

be more wrong. And when you're talking about a channel with millions of impressions, making a small change in color could mean your videos are clicked 1% more, which means thousands, if not millions, more views, which means it's shared more, seen more, which means thousands if not millions more views which means it's shared more seen more which means the channel grows And that's not from him going back and recreating and reinventing the wheel. No, it's using the key he has in his pocket right now You know, and that's the reason I found this so incredible because until that moment I'd always approached the platform with a sledgehammer, right, using our metaphor. I had this idea that, you know, I truly found to be an epiphany and changed the way I think about things so I'd get really excited, I'd make a video about

it, I'd release it out to the world and maybe it wouldn't do so well, you know, people wouldn't watch that particular video, it would just kind of sit there and my thought was always, alright, hey, it worked for me, must not a hit for everyone else, that's life, on to the next one. Never did I think for a second that, hey, you don't need to recreate the wheel, you're looking for a bulldozer when you need a key, right? You need to slightly adjust the titling or make the thumbnail more appealing, right? And the idea is these little tweaks are sometimes all that's required. You know, we think we got to reach out and find some answer or readjust every aspect of what we're doing. And it's like, no, it's a little

thing and it's right in front of you and it's very manageable and it's very realistic. And believe me, especially for people that aren't content creators, and there's a lot of you listening to this right now, I get how trivial it seems. But isn't that the point? And sure enough, within the next few months, I changed some thumbnail pictures around and two videos that were just sitting there got hundreds of thousands of more views. And I, you know, as I tend to do, look at the bigger picture. Well, how many times in life are you trying to find this monumental answer? And it's like, nope, tweak here, adjustment here, change the way you are measuring success.

Then it changes your tactics. Think about productivity, right? I've been in the same boat. I want to be more productive. So how? Well, maybe if I get better at scheduling, I'll get scheduling tools, maybe some time management apps. I know I'll do a daily checklist. That'll do it. That's what I need. But in reality, the commonality when I have productive days is they all consist of me waking up, not stressed, having time to think, reflect, plan, and moving on. And it flows into every other aspect of my day. It doesn't require me to buy some thousand dollar productivity course. Big result often requires small manageable action. And again, the point here is that change can feel overwhelming because I think the default mechanism is to assume the next step needs to be as big as that desired result.

It's like, oh I want to climb that mountain so I have to figure out a way to jump that high. No, that's not true. You have to take small steps many times. And where we should be looking for consistency or something within our grasp or looking for some small self-contained miracle. You know everything feels bigger than it is. It's an interesting part about growing up.

You realize everything's not as big and intimidating and shiny and sparkly as it appears to be. We have the tools right now in real time. In fact, they're very ordinary, very unimpressive, and that's with goals just like people. I grew up seeing pictures of my grandfather, who was an admiral in the Navy, talking to American presidents and heads of state. And I'd ask him, how was that? What was that like? And he'd always say, look, they put their pants on one leg at a time, just like I do, just like you do.

I think in a lot of ways, you know, we need to take the glamour and the mystique away from the things we want and the people we aspire to be like, right? Big goals are an accumulation of little steps. And quote-unquote successful people are ordinary human beings who have the courage to take those steps. Not for attention or likes or follows, but because they cared and they respected the process enough to stick it out. And so can I, and so can you, right? You have everything you need. Whether you're talking about creating on YouTube or putting yourself in position to conquer the day, learning or emulating those you

admire, nothing is otherworldly for you. Sure you'll have your strengths and your weaknesses because we all do, but there's no magic you need to find or acquire. No bulldozer or sledgehammer needed to lessen the gap between real and ideal. Just the understanding that the key in your pocket, the one you already have, will get you through the door. It's not a commitment to perfection. It's a commitment to remind yourself that every time you're stuck or overwhelmed or lost, that perhaps you're looking for miracles in the clouds

when the solution is simple at your feet. It's not the mountain, it's one rock. It's not the forest, it's one tree. It's not the journey, it's one step. And as time goes by, you'll find yourself moving beyond that previous reality, beyond those looking for the home run or otherworldly answers. And beyond the narrative that you don't have what it takes because you do and you always did. You simply had to commit to walking that path. Thanks for listening.

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