Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - BIG DREAMS NEED BIG SACRIFICES - Discipline Yourself - Best Motivational Speeches Compilation

Episode Date: December 23, 2024

What if the cracks in your armor aren’t weaknesses but doorways to something greater? In this episode, we explore the beauty found in imperfection and the strength forged through struggle. Life’s challenges are like the micro-tears in a muscle—necessary stress that leads to growth and transformation. By embracing the moments when we break, we allow ourselves to rebuild stronger, uncover meaning, and create something extraordinary from the pieces. Let your cracks be where the light gets in, and discover how breaking can lead to a brighter, more meaningful tomorrow. Monday Motivation Newsletter: https://www.eddiepinero.com/newsletter Free Ebook: www.eddiepinero.com/ebook  YouTube: www.eddiepinero.com/youtube 

You were made to break. To be imperfect, intentionally reckless, you were made to break. And thank God. Because I want you to imagine a world where you never cracked. Imagine a world where you never had to pick yourself up and put yourself back together. How truly tragic that would be. Why? Well, it's in the tearing down and building up that we sculpt the beauty, that we chisel away the monotony and create a meaning of sorts.

Like muscles at the gym, stressed, taxed, intentionally put through the rigors of resistance, micro tears that teach it, ah, I can not only endure, but I can strengthen. That by challenging the status quo, I get a tomorrow that promises more than today. So break. Allow yourself to crack. In fact, there's a saying that it's from our cracks that the light shines through, that meaningful things, more often than not were born of broken things,

that it wasn't being sheltered from life, but thrust upon it that the true magic materialized. Took me years to learn this. And it is, I've been surprised to discover, something that must be relearned every day. My mind resists and my body fights back. It doesn't want me to be broken. My head wants to navigate away from broken things because broken is flawed, right?

Broken is imperfect, you know? And isn't perfect the goal? Getting a 10 of 10? Highlight reel, filters, elevator speeches, accolades, who the hell has time to crack in a world that demands smooth edges and shiny? these surfaces. So I asked myself, at least until about 26, when I first learned that cracking, breaking, disassembling is the precursor to all excellence, the precursor to progress in and of itself,

the precursor to anything other than staring out a window and hoping life presents you what you want. One of the most dangerous words I've come to know is perfect. Because perfect is a defense mechanism. Perfect is a wolf in sheep's clothing. Show me perfection and I'll show you fear. Show me someone who won't go until it's flawless and I'll show you someone who is deeply, deeply afraid.

I think our default setting positions is to seek the wrong things because beauty is not perfect. Beauty is bruised knees. scraped elbows, beauty is hurt pride in a crushed ego. Beauty is getting it wrong, not just once, but over and over again. Because these things allow for the breaking down, and the breaking down is the only thing that invites the building up. So you fear cracks and jagged edges?

I fear lacking the courage to let life humble me. I fear clean shoes, predictability, and a life void of criticism. I fear a world where I stay right where I am, untarnished, and perfectly assembled. Today and every day after, the goal is to let life crack me wide open. Let the light shine through. Let me build again and again. and again from the pile of broken things that I have made. Let me take them and assemble a world that means something

like a phoenix rising from the ashes to start anew every day. Forget the illusions of perfection. Forget the off-ramps and false security interwoven into what you know now because you were made for more. You were made to stretch. to explore, to live. You were made to break.

The world, it needs you. But it needs the real you. Not the one with the mask looking to blend in, nor the one making all those concessions to avoid being left out. No, the real you. With your flaws and your insufficiencies, your strengths and your gifts, your hopes and your dreams,

it needs the you that so often hides away underneath that blanket of caution and skepticism. The you that's coupled with vulnerability. More easily ignored than brought to life with conviction. But that's the you this world. needs. When I was younger, I seemed to separate life into two categories. Me and one, and everyone else and the other. And guess which of the two categories I assumed had it all figured out? In my mind, I was the one, the only one who didn't know, the one who was winging it, stumbling my way through each and every day. All those other people, though, they not only were.

only had plans, they had the right plans. They knew the right details, but I didn't. And so in my head, me being right required I necessarily look to them. I follow their lead. Since there exists an established, correct path, that must be where I steer the ship. But then some time passes.

You grow older, maybe pick up a little wisdom along the way. You realize that no one really knows what they're doing. There are very few objectively correct roads that must be traveled. Life is not a paint by number, it's a blank canvas. And understanding this changed the image in my head from one of me knocking on the door of a party everyone else was at, to visualizing almost 8 billion individual souls running around trying to figure things out in the limited stretch of time they have here on planet

Earth. I realized I had at times felt small only because of the gravity I attributed to people who were just trying to figure it out themselves. And the point, certainly not to diminish anyone else's journey. It was to give myself permission to embark upon my own. It's just hard to do that when you view everyone else as one collective, all-knowing entity. As opposed to 8 billion people just like you with thoughts, fears, hopes, and plans. The question is not what is the right thing to do here.

The question is, when will you allow yourself to venture out into the world and find what the right thing means for you. That's what's required. And the world will be better for you having found it. Because after all, no one sees life like you do. No one has the background or worldview. The universe has conspired to put you as you are here now. Almost an impossible occurrence in and of itself.

How easy that is to forget. We were born on the summit, yet the inclination for some reason is to keep our eyes closed. No, open them. Take it all in. Allow the view to propel you forward. The world needs you. It needs you with your mistakes that have helped you evolve into the person you could never have been without them. It needs you with your worries and your fears.

Conquering them will be pivotal in your evolution. It needs you with your flaws and blemishes. How else would life convince you that the things that make you different are the same things that make you strong? It doesn't matter how many people tell you or try to explain to you the magnitude of what's at your feet. Life does not begin until you allow yourself to start living. Until you realize that yesterday does not define you. And the categories in which you've placed yourself, they're transitory. The past is not the reason you can or can't begin again.

It's not who you are forever. No, it's the advantage you now possess as you move forward, should you choose to move forward. It's in realizing you are bound by nothing that you free yourself. And for the one wondering, why does it matter what I think? Why should I start or try or risk anything? Why should I pick up the brush and start painting on that canvas before me? Well because that step is where it all begins, the meaning, the purpose, it's all predicated upon our willingness to pick that brush up and start painting.

You ask what's the point? The point is everything. One detail at a time we dismantle our previously held notions about what life is supposed to be and finally start living one that matters. No one's masterpiece will look like yours. No one's depiction of life will follow the same parameters you've etched onto that canvas. In fact, there are people that will be changed forever because you chose to live your life fully. There are lives of those around you that will be transformed because you picked up the brush.

There are stories that will now end in the world. that will now end in triumph because you found the courage to start, to see light in yourself. You being fulfilled and the world being better off, they're not two different things. When you live a life true to yourself, when you let go of the half-toes and step into the get-toes, the world experiences the luxury of the beauty that comes next. When you fill your cup up first, you're able to then, replenish those around you. That's not nothing. So who are you? Beneath the characterizations, beneath the roles you've taken on, beneath what you feel you're supposed to be. All that.

Who are you and will you give life to that person? Will you be that courageous? After all, that's what life is. It's not a game of right and wrong so much as it's a game of courage. The ones willing to take the leap end up worlds away from where they began. So my ask of you is that you begin tearing down those walls created in your head. The ones that accumulated over days and months and years. The ones that box you in or keep you out that suggest you are anything other than that one in four hundred trillion miracle. to embark upon the right of a lifetime.

And sure, it means shedding the comfort of obscurity, the safety of projection. Looking yourself in the mirror and saying, I am worth it. And there's more out there means without question you are taking off the training wheels, dancing with vulnerability. But it also means when that time comes

and you look back on how you lived your days, you can say, I truly, you can say that the world needed me, and I had the courage to heed its call. You can become so fixated on winning or losing the game that you forget to ask yourself, am I playing the right one? Is this my game? Am I setting myself up to win in an arena of significance to me? Because look, there are infinite games out there.

And sometimes we find ourselves caught up in a race. We have no business running. Meaning it doesn't really do anything for us. It's not where we want to be or should be. There's a saying by someone, and a few social media outlets actually restricted my post for suggesting it was Einstein. So it might not be Mr. Einstein.

But whoever said it, thank you, you're awesome. The saying goes, everyone is a genius. but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing it's stupid. Now, there are a lot of us fish out there attempting to climb trees as we speak, wondering why we're not where we want to be, perhaps seeing the results or lack thereof as an indication that we're insufficient, inadequate in some way, when, hey, that's not the case at all.

It's that we haven't taken the time to identify our own personal intersection of what we love and what adds value to the world. We haven't manufactured those fireworks. That's something that has to be explored, found. J.R.R. Tolkien, not all who wander are lost, right? And I think we innately fear this process of searching because it's unsettling to not know how things are going to play out. Trust me, I've been there, right? it's taxing to not have your packaged little elevator speech and a five-year vision when it seems like the whole world does. But to deprive yourself of this exploration is to potentially forfeit the

very thing that you come to live for. Most of the time purpose doesn't fall into one's lap. You have to have your eyes open. What's meaningful must be sought out. Now, I'm going to play a little devil's advocate here because our world is not black and white, it sort of lives in this gray space, right? Can you win at someone else's game? Sure. There are a lot of people, quote unquote, succeeding in areas that are not ideal, that they don't love, that they're not their best in, but how is success being defined? I've talked extensively about my journey and all those games I used to play the targets I used to aim for. And I know a lot of people, who've come to similar epiphanies, right?

But when you don't realize, you can exit stage left and begin again, start something new, you simply continue this same song and dance. Right? It's not life that keeps us confined. It's ignorance that keeps us confined. We simply have to be taught that there's more.

And I understand to find an arena where you can thrive, in a purely historical context is a luxury. And you are programmed to survive. You're not programmed to build an art studio because it's your passion, right? But there lies the battle. We are at a place in time where we have collectively cultivated abundance.

The phone you're using to consume this content, that little thing can be a portal that transports your thoughts, your creation, your business, to the masses. You have at your fingertips access to billions of people. You have reach that humans

only 30 years ago, all the way back to the beginning of mankind, could only dream of. The means are there. In so many ways, it's about freeing yourself to pursue the opportunity that exists all around you, because we self-limit.

Alan Watts asked the ever-important question, what would you do if money were no object? Now, in a practical world, why ask such a question? Simple, because removing those monetary constraints as you contemplate your answer, allows you to truly analyze what endeavors are meaningful to you. When something is meaningful, you want to do it.

When you want to do it, you immerse yourself in those little intricacies, in those details that the average person simply doesn't. pay attention to. Making you so good at whatever that thing is that eventually, not only can you be the best at it, but you can monetize it and probably at a very high rate. It's not money holding you back. It's not time holding you back. It's not the external world holding you back. It's what you have been conditioned to believe that's holding you back. You are a genius at something. You are

king or queen of your empire, victor within your arena. But to realize these things, you have to, one, understand it's a possibility and two, refuse to stay stagnant. We have to stop conceding so much while simultaneously accepting so little. Life will never provide what you do not ask for.

So why? Why be scared to ask? Life won't tell you you're a fish climbing a tree. You must tell you that. Life won't expand your horizons and adjust your trajectory. You must initiate that change. To find your genius, you must be willing to leave what's insufficient. To capture what's meaningful, you must be willing.

you must be willing to leave what is meaningless. Let's agree to alter the question, do I have genius level talent? Because you do. And you live in a society that also rewards those who realize it. The question we need to be willing to ask is are you willing to walk on shaky ground?

to abandon, at least for a period of time, safety and the comfort of predictability in order to find that genius. Are you willing to nurture the greatness that already lives within you? Because it was never a matter of ability. It's a matter of what you're willing to discover. So you've made a decision.

Congrats. you're 3% done. Now I'm paraphrasing, but that's an idea from author and entrepreneur Lee Benson. Belief and execution, the duo that will change your life. First, believe. Why?

Because nothing happens without belief. Nothing begins without an understanding and a trust that the future contains something of value. That the seeds of discomfort being planted will bear fruit. We simply don't walk through doors if we don't believe something of value exists on the other side. And then there's execution.

The doing. Congrats. You gave yourself permission to begin. That was a big step, right? But now you have to deal with life. And life, my friends, is no picnic. It's in the doing that success is either obtained or not. that a new reality is birthed or not.

In the book, your most important number, Lee Benson has said, so you've made a decision, congrats your 3% done. Why? Because, well, now comes the implementation, the execution. Now the feet are on the ground and the wheels, the road, and we must transform the thoughts into things,

thinking can be so much more convenient than doing. Execution is trying things. It's recognizing the attempts that didn't work. It's moving forward only to realize wrong path or wrong approach. Or maybe what's required of you is not yet something you're capable of producing and so you must evolve. It's seeing setbacks as data point. It's understanding that to not know is okay because we collect our answers as we go.

It's seeing the journey is an experiment, one in which we seek to understand ourselves and the world, there is so much contained in that 97%. It's a write your own ending storybook. An infinite number of paths and outcomes, but ultimately only discoverable by you. And I think that's one of the most beautiful things about life. And once you give yourself permission to walk a certain path, once you believe in something greater than the world as it currently exists, you become an artist,

painting something that was not there before. Using the highs as little benchmarks to remind you why you started to begin with when your landscape becomes gray. It's using the lows as fuel that turns the ordinary into extraordinary that slingshots the old you to the new you, adding brightness and vibrance to the overall scene. You're encapsulating all of it as you move through that great unknown, as you push further and further into the abyss.

You're playing the role of Maker. Not because you knew how it would all turn out, but because you didn't, and still you executed. Recently in an interview, I heard Alex Hermosie and now accomplished entrepreneur in his own right, talking about some of his failings, consulting gyms in the fitness industry, the moment when things went south, and he lost it all. Now, for a moment, he thought he had. Money, assets, and perhaps even the pride, gone.

But came to learn that money and those assets, they are lagging indicators. They aren't the value that's obtained. The value is who you become. The value is learning how to be someone who can obtain those things in the first place. It's emerging from the old restriction and limitation, the old narratives, because that cannot be taken away. When we execute, we're making ourselves something we other ones, could never have become.

And so Alex learned that what he lost was insignificant compared to what he gained. And why is this such a common theme? Industry leaders, folks speaking on their accomplishments, I think the answer is simple because you don't get there without the doing and the execution. And if to execute means to step forward without having all the answers, After all, we are only human. Life will humble us. Excellence must be a game of trial and error.

We can't escape those lost-everything stories. Because choosing the right path every time, well, that only happens when you choose no path at all. We have to act and be okay understanding that action brings with it mistakes and lessons and setbacks. You know, all those. little annoying things that become greatness. 97% is left because the path before you is unwalked. But know that it contains everything. Everything you need. So believe it,

decide, because nothing starts without that initial 3%. But nothing changes without the subsequent 97. That's where we are shaped. And we And when you come face to face with the inevitable adversity, know that life might take the material gains. It might demand a price you deem to be steep. It might collect as a toll assets you've been accumulating along the way, but it can't take what you know or who you've become. And that is why you execute. To build the world around you, yes, but most importantly, to build yourself into someone who can thrive in such an environment. It's in doing that the man is built and as was said in Gary Keller's

book the one thing, build the man and the world falls into place. 90 seconds is too much. Just is. I can't do 90 seconds and I can't do 90 seconds because my brain can't compute 90. seconds, that I can do 30 seconds. And I can do 30 seconds forever. As we navigate our day to day, it's hard to see that because so often our day to day lacks clarity. So what can we do about it? Well, we can place ourselves in situations where we are reminded. One of them, I've talked about before, being the cold plunge, immersing yourself in cold water. We're sure there are health benefits,

some of which are debated and disputed, but I certainly notice value in that department. But to me, that's not the biggest value at, not even close. To me, it's simply the daily reminder that I can do hard things, that it's who I am. We need to reestablish that, consistently. Confidence is earned. And I know in my life I must earn it repeatedly. And when I'm

immersed in the cold and shivering, there's always a point in my mind, however brief, that I'm thinking I want out now. The other day, I was at this point, looked at my watch 90 seconds left, and that day in that moment, it felt like an eternity, just too much. And those of you who are endurance athletes, for example, you know that when your body's operating at max capacity, you're suffering, you're exhausted. 90 seconds is truly a lifetime. When you look at it like that, it's too much discomfort for a minute and a half.

Your heart starts beating, your mind starts worrying, right? So what do we do about it? We look at it a little differently. Because from a different angle, you can skip it. You can do 30 seconds. can grasp and digest 30 seconds. You can do anything for 30 seconds. Okay.

So you start counting. All of a sudden, 30 gone. Now what? Well, you just did 30. You see how quick that went? Do another 30. Okay, done, just like that. Now what, 30 more?

But this is the last 30. You don't even feel anything on the last 30, right? Come on, adrenaline's going. You can feel the finish line. This is free time. This is a gift. This is cruise. control. And now done. You didn't have to do 90 seconds. You only had to do three by 30.

And anyone's saying, come on, man, that's the same thing. Yeah, it's the same when you're not under duress, but it's a miracle when you are. So why is running life? Why is cold plunging life? Why is putting your body through stress or difficulty life? Because you remember that life is taking big, difficult, seemingly complex things and breaking them down into manageable tasks. That is life. The pieces are always manageable. Now the monster we allow the pieces to become when we stack them up and give them an invisible face, that's not so manageable. That's self-sabotage. And so to arm yourself with the understanding that all big things must be broken down

is to green light the extraordinary. On day one in 2014, a YouTube channel with zero subscribers growing to help over 100,000 people a day, that's a 90 second cold plunge. That's unfathomable, unthinkable, impossible. But one video, weekly, at least, for nine years, that's a 30 second cold. Standing in front of the mirror, practicing storytelling, speaking,

it's 30 seconds. Reaching out to others to learn to get better, 30 seconds in cold water. look back and you see that you endured that 90-second plunge simply by breaking it down. That's all growth is. That's all evolution is. Finding the smallest piece possible in making it actionable. And then watching that transform multiply compound over time.

In one of my favorite books, Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand, this reminder comes through beautiful. Louis Amperini, an American prisoner of war in Japanese internment camps during World War II. He basically experiences unimaginable hell and suffering. He watches his friends die, he's beaten, he's starved, he comes close to death himself, and at the end when he's rescued, and I'm paraphrasing, but I remember this part incredibly vividly. He's asked if he could do that again and he states he'd rather die. He's turning around and viewing it holistically like that is too much. It's unfathomable. That pain is bigger than one can even comprehend. But taking something like that day by day, step by step, he did the unthinkable. He survived. In breaking the

90-second task down into 30-second pieces he walked away in breaking the seemingly insurmountable down into the manageable and looking at each individual step as a superpower he emerged. You talk about perspective. His experience was as challenging as it gets. My cold plunge is laughable in comparison, but my mind doesn't know that. It's up to me to re-enely. It's up to me to enforcement. Building a business is nothing in comparison to Louise Zamperini, but my mind doesn't know that. Healing my shoulder and getting stronger in the gym is nothing in comparison, but my mind does not know that. It's looking at the mountain and reminding myself, Eddie, you can't leap those. I've seen you jump, buddy.

But the good news is, no mountains need be left here. We ascend this thing one rock at a time and mark my words, you conquer those manageable tasks day in and day out. You will find yourself. So when you feel stuck or too small for the task at hand, remind yourself, you're looking at a 90-second block here. Break that down. Ask yourself what your 30 is. Ask yourself what you can create that's manageable. that will create your momentum, that will shoot you into a trajectory,

that will allow growth and position you someday to look back over your shoulder and go, wow, I endured all that. A transformation too big to understand on day one. It's a beautiful thing watching all those little steps add up to create the extraordinary. One of the more powerful realizations I've had, both in business and life overall, is that what we do to win today and what we do to position ourselves to win tomorrow,

they're often very different things. And we've probably all experienced this in some capacity. We get sucked into the cycle of doing, becoming so task-oriented that we don't make time to step back and ask, which direction do I want this ship to go? Because sure, we have to keep it afloat. and we have to keep it afloat now. But also, we have to navigate.

The ship's role isn't solely to float, right? It's a transportation mechanism, a vehicle. Where are we going? And so the question becomes, how do we balance the two? I came across an awesome book by Lee Benson called Your Most Important Number. And I'm about halfway through, but already finding a ton of value that I'll be sharing in the future, primarily around positioning your business for success. And one of the first things the book discusses

is the difference between what Lee calls eating and dreaming. Eating being the things we need to do now. To take care of matters that are essential for today, the things that need to get done. So using the same metaphor, actions to keep that boat afloat. And then there's the dreaming, which is essentially doing things now, that help position the organization for success in the future down the road.

It's asking, what can I do today that will ensure we are winning tomorrow? So boat metaphor, it's planning for storms that may arise later in the journey. It's analyzing the best destinations and charting the course. And here's what really struck me. Lee suggests, based on his consulting, that ideally leaders should be, I believe the number was 80% dreaming and 20% percent. eating. So yeah, doing what has to be done today, obviously, but largely focused on positioning the organization and themselves for success in the days to come. And what he's found

is that very often out in the world that ratio is flipped. People are so consumed by the day to day that the future takes a back seat to the nuance and the quote unquote putting out fires of the present moment. We're spending 80% of our time eating. Now, like most things, this is not one-size-fits-all. Say, front-line manager at a factory is not going to be 80% dreaming and 20% eating. Their task requirements are different. But the point remains, it's imperative that we in some capacity utilize our resources now to look ahead. I don't know if I've ever told this story, but I always joke around with my brother about it.

When we were kids in Southern California, we'd have these... We'd have these basically battles on the beach, right, where we'd go down to the hard sand right in front of the water. And we'd each build these little wall slash fort type things, maybe 20 feet apart from each other. This is like emulating World War I type stuff. And then we'd make cannonballs out of sand and just throw the sand at each other.

So in a way, this is a perfect metaphor, because we would always be juggles, struggling, on one hand, building the fort that would protect us from the other person. So, dreaming. And then on the other hand, I mean, those things hurt, right? We'd have to in real time be dodging incoming sand simultaneously to building that wall. So the eating. And he's a bit younger than me, so admittedly this wasn't really fair.

But regardless, you know, he would get so consumed with throwing sand that his wall would be really cheaply made. At the beginning, I'd be trying to make this really solid base foundation. He would just be pelting me with this stuff, and it was brutal. But as time went on, I'd build that wall higher and higher. Eventually, it would be lights out for him. He'd have nothing to hide behind. The young buck was doing, let's say, way less than 80% dreaming. And so I'm no longer building castles in the sand. But as the Rose said, now I'm looking to build them in the air, seeking to bring things into life that are merely ideas and concepts in my head.

And naturally this prompted me to ask, well, what's my ratio now? Because it sure feels like I'm doing a lot of eating. It sure feels like I spend a lot of time every day, you know, dodging Mikey Peas, incoming sand cannon balls, right? Things are going to be different tomorrow than they are today. And to truly win, we need to be. to be asking ourselves, how do we build that bridge? From the present to the future?

How do we lay out stepping stones that will allow an evolution in what we're doing? And I'm thinking, if my day's 95% consumed with eating-type tasks, then I need to figure things out here, right? Is it automate? Is it eliminate? Is it delegate? It's something because the ship needs to be more effectively captained. And I'd love these epiphanies. Just a change in mindset that can completely redirect one's entire trajectory. And it's funny, I was having a conversation earlier today with a friend about scaling and impact and growth.

Another person I love to throw ideas back and forth to, and he asked me, well, Eddie, what are some of the ways your world within could make money? And I was like, oh, it's easy, right? And so I laid it all out in great detail, the ins and outs. and he says, that's awesome. But that's not the question I asked you. You answered a different question. You answered, how is the business making money now? I asked, how can it make money in the future?

Boom, another epiphany, one of those instances where you catch yourself thinking small. And this isn't a knock on the work I'm doing now or the system's in place now. They're great now, but again, now isn't for. forever. If you have plans to add more value and create more impact, build more things, that has to be baked into your time and resource allocation. We all have to eat because we don't want to starve, but we also have to dream. Because if we're unable to look ahead, we simply

will not be equipped to handle the turbulence of tomorrow. There's a duality to this game. And I think the ratio with which we're juggling the two deserves consistent attention and examination. Now, yeah, life is seasonal. There are times where keeping that ship afloat takes everything we have, but it's understanding that that is a season and not the way things are. Dreaming allows us to start moving in the right direction, even if it's one small step at a time. today piece by piece, something we can stand on tomorrow, a staircase, to the version 2.0 and 3.0 and 4.0. The future depends on what we do today, and so we must create space

for that seed to grow. We must chart the course and captain the ship to the next horizon. I want to share a theme with you that continuously reemerges in my life. And every time it does, I'm grateful. I'm a little bolder, a little wiser, a little more grounded. The idea is simple. It's creating a low barrier to entry. Let me explain what I mean. The other day I was on a call with Ashley.

It was a brilliant member of the team here. and we're talking about social media. And as we're talking, I'm going on and on about the end state, how I think things should in a perfect world be with our platforms and the output. And it's important to know for this particular project, we're kind of on the ground floor, right? So in reality, I couldn't possibly know what the end state's going to be.

There's a lot of epiphanies to be had. There's twists and turns that I couldn't possibly anticipate. I think it's great to have a North Star in a vision, obviously, but winning in the long run requires observation and reflection and adjustment and on and on. So as I'm speaking, you know, she's listening, nodding her head, you know, agreeing with the vision. But after some thoughts as well, why don't we just start with what we have now, right? Keep the barrier of entry low so that there's less friction, and we can start seeing how, you know, things evolve. And I thought that was just incredible, right?

It's what I temporarily lost in the moment, for sure. You win by going and then evolving. So many would-be amazing pursuits were never started because, you know, we make initiating them too complex. Same thing happened on another call that same day. I'm talking to Tyler, a business partner for another project coming around the corner. And, you know, I'm sending them videos, talking about ideas for rollout, different avenues we could take. Which, again, it's great.

It's better to have a large vision and trim it down than no vision at all, but the convo is the same. You know, Ed, I love it. It's great. But what if we start with one thing, though? One idea. Let's get the gears turning. That needed to be the theme. for the day and I appreciated it, right?

So a few thoughts, one, surround yourself with sharp people like Ashley and Tyler that keep you grounded, but two, and perhaps the main point, stop creating friction for yourself when you're beginning new things. I've talked about this in different contexts, you know, and I've hammered it into my day-to-day in many ways, right? Like if I'm going on a run, you know,

I have the running stuff by the door and ready to go with a glass of water the night before so that when I wake up, the process feels, so easy that to not go would seem stupid. But life is complex, and so are we. It was a great reminder that your handle on something in one area of life doesn't mean you'll implement it across the board.

And I was grateful for that reminder. It was what I needed at that time, right? The reminder that winning is going. Winning is beginning. Because you're immersing yourself in the process and you're acclimating to it. You're seeing what works and what doesn't. You're growing, as opposed to taking an extra three months

to put into place parameters that will probably change anyway. One of my favorite mantras is simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. Powerful, but sometimes elusive. But if you can keep it front and center, it adds immense value to your life. The most powerful thing you can do is of a general sense of direction

and go now with what you have. Ashley and I will change our social media tactics many, many times in the future because we're collecting data and we're moving forward. Tyler and I will approach our venture in probably countless ways. Because we're not in love with a particular strategy, we're in love with the end goal. And perhaps you in your world are at a point where you're seeking to initiate something new. And you're playing with the pros and cons,

your listing ideas in your head. Categorizing details and nuance that, sure, it seems important right now in this moment, but will it forever? My advice to you is to mitigate detail and instead place the value on finding the courage to begin now. Before you're ready, before you have all the answers, before you know how X, Y and Z is going to unfold, mitigate the friction to such an extent extent that the pursuit feels like an ice hockey rink. You're sliding into whatever comes next.

Never underestimate how powerful that is. And be reassured by the fact that in three months from now or a year from now, the journey won't look the same. You'll be better in execution and wiser in strategy because you simply created a low barrier to entry. You leveraged perhaps the most important. important ability you possess, you began. I was watching a masterclass by author Margaret Atwood.

It was on storytelling. And, you know, I knew going into it, it would be interesting. I'm not a particular fan of her work, at least from a content perspective. But look, we're talking about someone who's, you know, truly made a mark on the world. Right? But there's a lot to be learned from her, so I buckled in and listened to what she had to say. And unsurprisingly, there was a lot of wisdom there. And there was one idea in particular that really resonated with me.

Both as a writer, yeah, but also outside the quote-unquote creative space, which I'll get to in a second. The idea was centered around finding the moment to begin, a story's true starting point. And it was interesting. She said, you know, people think stories start on page one. But she'll pick up a book. And I don't remember if she was referencing new authors or maybe someone, a book just off the shelf at a bookstore. But she'll be reading it and she'll think, ah, okay, so this story really begins on page 10. That's the starting point. I think she even referenced her own writing process, being a few chapters in and thinking, ah, this needs to be the starting point. Got to cut away the other stuff and move this up to page one. And, you know, understanding that's obviously important for those looking to entertain and captivate an audience.

You need to give the reader a reason to stick around. But I can also very easily draw a parallel from that to, you know, a bigger picture, our real world. All I could think about was, you know, what story are you telling yourself and where did it start? or more importantly, has it even started? There's something both liberating and beautiful about the fact that all of us in the stories we are living could at any moment recreate that metaphorical first page. And I believe that with all my heart.

Like we think, oh, page one started years ago. This is how things are now. This is where I exist in life. But what about the idea that beginnings don't have to start, on page one. What about the idea that you can cut away as much as necessary to create the right beginning?

The story that feels right to you. We don't know anything to the words that were written leading up to now. We're not beholden to the chapters that came before. Robin Sharma talks about the idea of killing your darlings, which is an old saying that refers to that very challenging task, writer's face, of cutting away the things

that aren't absolutely essential to the story's main narrative. It's hard to do. We place value and importance on these things because they feel like a part of us. We feel like they're too significant to dismiss. But in reality, the act of letting go is ultimately a value add

because it ensures that what matters is what stays. It's the ability to understand that the story doesn't begin when thoughts become words. It begins when there's alignment. When the story captivates, inspires, and in the one you're writing, the one that is your life, you can always make that moment right now.

There's always a new novel that can be written with new objectives and characters and storylines. It's okay to chop anything that led to this moment. It's okay to create a beginning as you stand here today, right? It's the idea of sunk costs that changed my life years ago. Just because you spent a long time making a mistake doesn't mean you need to continue making it. Just because you've been writing this story of your life for years

doesn't mean the beginning is behind you. You can start this story. You can start this novel here. You can begin this epic adventure now. And I think there's tremendous power in looking at life like that. It's never too late for a new beginning. It's never wrong or impossible to, even at chapter 4, put your finger down on a new starting point and say,

this is where it all begins. Where the new ideal takes shape. We are all authors. And if authors have anything, it's control over the narrative. It's the ability to design a world that aligns with the one they imagine. Hey y'all, it's Kelly Clarkson, here to talk. Wayfair. No matter your space, style, or budget, shop Wayfair.com to make your home way more you.

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