Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - DISCIPLINE EVERY SINGLE DAY - Motivational Speech

Episode Date: June 5, 2024

"Strength and growth come only through continuous effort and struggle." – Napoleon Hill In this episode, Eddie Pinero delves into the journey of growth and how to handle times when progress slows down. Drawing from his own experience of building a YouTube channel, Eddie shares key strategies for overcoming these challenges: Pause and Breathe: Regain composure when growth seems to stall. Seek Understanding: Identify what caused the slowdown. Make Adjustments: Implement necessary changes based on your findings. Trust the Process: Maintain faith in your overall journey. Eddie emphasizes that highs and lows are natural parts of any growth process. The lows help us appreciate the highs, and this applies to both personal and professional relationships. Listen in as Eddie discusses how small adjustments can lead to significant improvements and how to keep pushing forward, even during tough times. Monday Motivation Newsletter: https://www.eddiepinero.com/newsletter Free Ebook: www.eddiepinero.com/ebook  YouTube: www.eddiepinero.com/youtube 

Hey there, it's Ryan Sechrest for Safeway. Now through February 25th, stock up on your favorite self-care items and save up to $3 shop in store or online for items like Old Spice Deodorant, always ultra-thin pads, Gillette Fusion Razors and Refills, Old Spice Total Body Spray, Tampax Pearl, and Gillette Mach 3 Razors and refills and save up to $3. You won't want to miss out on these deals. Offer ends February 25th. Offers may vary. Restrictions apply.

Visit Safeway.com for more detail. on new tech. Upgrade the whole team at Lenovo.com. Unlock AI experiences with the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, powered by Intel Core Ultra processors so you can work, create, and boost productivity all on one device. When the tech search for business PCs at Lenovo.com. I'm going to share with you a general metaphor about life. It's brought me a ton of value, help me maintain, perspective over the years and I think it's going to help you as well. I'm going to be using YouTube as my example here but worry not this applies to everything. I just happen to be immersed in the content creation space. So to frame it, the growth of a YouTube channel is a lot like

this stock market. You certainly want it trending up over time. You want your work to reach, you know, as many people as it can. But there are and have been segments along the way where that growth slows down. There are times when the channel overall, it just gets less engagement, less views, all of it. And you look at it when that's happening, when you're in the midst of one of those dips, and you think, oh no, what have I done? Anytime something you're creating slows down, it can be jolting. And this has over the years occurred many times, and every time my instinct. is the same. It's, ugh. You know, that type of just duress. And I put a lot of time, energy,

effort into this. This work is someone of what I'm most proud of in my life. So it's like, sound the alarm, right? Now I need to figure this out. And every time, things eventually correct and continue in that upward trend, sometimes it takes a little longer than others, but I get there. And here's what I've learned. When there is a dip or a slowing down of anything that's going in the opposite direction of the way you want it to go, I do four things.

One, pause and breathe. Because you have to. Re-gain, recapture that perspective. Life, as I say so often, is simply not that serious, so stop making mountains out of mole hills. Two, seek to understand why. There is some sort of change. What's different?

What prompted the change? Knowing that is power. So find it. Three, once you have that information, make the necessary alteration. It's not only about having the answer, but it's in implementation. It's adjusting. It's testing. And four, be patient.

Trust the process. You can be ferocious in your day. day to day and also calm and poised with the overall process and faith in its unfolding. And so I'm going to give you one more YouTube example and then we'll pull it up to a level that's more broad and applicable everywhere, right? Something interesting about YouTube is that a lot of channels only have a handful of videos. We'll say four or five that generate the majority of that channel's interactions. It's a pretty common thing. So when things slow down, you can often point to one of those four or five videos.

So let's say something does. There's a dip. You one, you take that breather. Two, you inquire. Pull back the hood. What's going on? It looks like one of these videos is not getting clicked as much as it was or it should. Okay, that's great to know.

Now what do we do about it? Test different thumbnails. Try new ones. And you try and it fails. And you try and it fails. and you try and it fails and you try and bam one resonates this new thumbnail gets clicked 3.3% of the time instead of 2.8 everything goes back up impressions go back up we have righted the ship right and i know that's a very detailed example not everyone's a YouTuber but everyone's you know in

their own way niche down doing their thing right and so you have to look at it in the context of what you're doing. What's your metaphorical YouTube channel? When things are wrong, how can you pull back the hood, identify that piece, and tweak? If we step outside that box, what we'll find is that life is like that stock market. It's like a YouTube channel. It's not up and up and up. There are lows. There are metaphorical recessions. There are times where it feels like the world is collapsing around us and we think, oh no, what do I do? What do I do? What do I do? It's over. In reality, Nothing is over. This is the roller coaster ride that is life.

You don't get highs without lows. And when you think about it, you wouldn't appreciate them without the lows either. The setbacks are baked into the growth. And I'll use relationships as another example because I know in some way it's relatable to everyone. When the wheels fall off the wagon with the relationship that meant something to you, whether it's a breakup, falling out with a friend, whatever the case may be, the tendency is to to perceive it as a falling down, the walls crashing down,

rather than a little blip on your S&P 500. So what do you do? Same exact plan. One, breathe. Understand that this is a process and all will be well. Two, you understand the why. You're human. You're going to feel emotion before you can reach any level of necessary pragmatism

to fix anything. So allow that to occur. Gather yourself and then ask what prompted the break. Were you too different? Did you not align? Why? What did you learn about yourself? About the type of people you allow into your life.

Three, once you have that information, adjust. How can you be better moving forward? You'll never be perfect. Human beings are complicated and messy and relationships are not an exact art. Too many variables. But that doesn't mean you can't improve your approach in the future, mitigate some of the mistakes you made, target the things in people that you truly value. And as you do and you are number four patient in the process, you'll find things level out and ultimately begin to rise. That situation was not and never was the end of you.

It was a necessary low before a future high. And so 10,000 foot view, remember that during your difficult times, those moments aren't indicators that life isn't working for you. They are part of every journey, factors necessary to every ascent. And if you see them as such, you will conquer them, learn from them, and climb them to that place you most need. to be. So I'm going to share a life lesson with you, something that over the years has been a true game changer. Ready? It's simple. It's very simple. Like most things, it's easy to understand. It's easy to comprehend. It's the implementation. That's the challenge, right? But it's the idea that progress is not always a visible step forward. Growth is not always a measurable inch or mile to feel good about it, to celebrate. It's not always a tangible victory or pat on the back.

it's a smile about. Sometimes it's sidestepping. Sometimes it's stepping backwards, reminding ourselves to look up and gain perspective because we are always inclined to look at the immediate. That's what feels good. And this lesson says no, there's a big picture to keep in mind. It reels us in. The big picture is what gives us purpose. It drives our happiness. That thing we want on the top of the hill. The North Star, the X on the map. That's what's. sustainable. And I say it's been a game changer for me because, you know, one of my biggest adversaries over the years has been that voice in my head, almost pleading with me to indulge in the thing that will bring that immediate result. It's money now, growth now, validation.

Now, there's comfort there. Our minds want that satisfaction. That's why you see all those guys standing next to whiteboard saying they have the formula to make you rich tomorrow. We want tomorrow. We believe in some capacity that that can be real tomorrow. But that's what tends to lead us astray. And so I've spent a lot of time reflecting over the years on how to incentivize those steps that aren't immediately impactful. There's not the flashy metal you're going to get right now, but I know that if I do it, it's going to bring me to my long-term goal.

How do I incentivize that? Because, like I said, the natural inclination is to dismiss it. I'm walking laterally across the mountain. so that ultimately I can find the most applicable path and ascend. And that's a scary thing. You know, building long term gives you very little to immediately slap on a resume, to brag or rant about at holiday parties. There's nothing flashy to impress with,

but it's believing in a long-term game, doing what most people can't, trading that certainty that you could have had for an extraordinary later. It's never a loss to do what has to be done, so that you can position yourself for the future. Sometimes you have to wade through the muck, work quietly in the dark, so that you can build something that you feel will have an impact.

It's not a loss to step backwards to tweak the things you're not happy with. It's not a loss to explore or question or reinvent. It's true, those actions in and of themselves aren't going to put money immediately in your pockets. But if you find the discipline to see the big picture, you realize that long term those things bring happiness, contentment, excitement,

Which, guess what? Leads to accomplishment and progress and the financial stability that you're looking for. Chasing flashy things, chasing the immediate moment, yeah, I'd get you a quick rush, a nice blast of dopamine, but it's empty. Ultimately, it's unfulfilling because nothing worth having is quick. That's life. But it's often the illusion that guides us. You'll never see how many auditions the 30,000. the 33-year-old actor went through before he was cast in a major film.

You don't see that. You don't see the countless hours and shows and midnight gigs in front of three people that the rock star endured. You just don't. It's not celebrated. We celebrate what we see, and what I've learned is that the most important things they're just not visible to the naked eye. And it's funny.

It's like people, they're ashamed or embarrassed by the fact that they're climbing to the top of their own hill to something truly significant to them, because the person next to them is bragging about blindly leaping three steps. Right? And that's great. Progress is great. But unless it's taking you to where you want to be most, is it a win? I have many friends that have left six-figure or hire jobs to podcast or create or start

their own businesses. And people's first reaction is always like, wow, look what you have. Look what you're walking away from. We see scarcity. We are naturally inclined to see life through a lens of scarcity. You need to remember that. That's what we do. We establish and protect our well-being.

That's why I've worked so hard to transform my thinking over the years. To look out and think, who cares what I had? Look what's out there. There are no limitations to what can be yours. If you're not on top of the world, make it happen. And I understand. People are complex. Situations, they're not easy.

They're intricate. Everyone's different. Everything is different. But there's a principle that's consistent. And it's that you can always improve your situation. That will never be false. To some degree you can improve your situation. There's always opportunity.

It's just what you see. A friend of mine sent me a text yesterday, saying the past and the future, they're just imagination. All you have is now. Everything other than split second is the story you're deciding to tell yourself. That's it. Think about that.

We're operating off what we decide is real or imaginary, possible or impossible. We're living in a world that is our own. There's no them or they are crowd, just individual people. all telling themselves some variation of a story. And so taking this back to the point, caving into that pressure, accommodating to the now

so that we feel important, so that our self-worth sees that temporary spike, it neglects the opportunity. It makes us feel like we're stepping forward that we're progressing, but in reality, are we? That voice, that pressure to conform to what will impress Richard next door will always lead to, it will always be to our detriment.

And it takes truly what I believe is the most pure, important aspect of life and sticks it in the closet so that we can feel like we're on par with everyone else. And I'll never forget starting out. And I bring this up a lot because it was one of those moments where I knew I recognized that a huge shift was happening in my life. Went out with some friends from college. And one's working for a senator. One's a Goldman. One's a lawyer. And I'm thinking, well, geez, I just quit my job.

But I have this really cool idea for a YouTube channel. And I just, you know, I don't think any girls are going to be swooning over that. And I struggled, right? At the time, it was difficult for me. And I'm, I look back and I'm just thankful every day that at the time I was able to locate somewhere in my soul, the courage to stick that out to believe that if I executed on this dream, I could have an impact. Because like I mentioned above, it was painful in the moment.

But when you think big picture, bigger things happen, right? I'm doing things now that I never, ever would have been able to do if I didn't have that that desire to do the unconventional thing. If I stopped at sort of the discomfort or if I stopped when I felt like I was losing this imaginary race to those people around me, I wouldn't have the creative flexibility that I have now. I wouldn't be able to do what I do now.

I wouldn't have the people in my life that I have now. You have to earn that every single day. And it makes me wonder how many people stopped when they could have taken their own path, brought their own unique vision into existence if they didn't retreat when they felt like they were a lone wolf when it felt like they were losing a race that didn't exist

when they felt like their neighbors were getting ahead or their classmates or their friends were doing the conventional things so they had to. They were too scared to step backwards and I'm telling you right now I'm telling you that step backwards that ability to temporarily find yourself to create yourself

that will mean everything. That will open doors for you that would never have existed. You never would have come across them because you would have been too scared to look for them. You have to make opportunities. Simple metaphor. Gumball machine.

Gumball does not come out if you don't put the quarter in and turn it. It's a price that has to be paid. Except in reality, the price is a lot higher than a quarter because we're conditioned to want to fit in. We're taking. terrified to look like we don't know what we're doing. Every significant thing around you

stemmed from someone pushing into that unknown. It came from someone risking everything. It's not easy when your family doesn't know what you're doing, your friends don't know what you're doing, or you don't know what you're doing. But if you want to have an impact, that is the road you have to take. That's the cost you need the price that you need to pay. It'll be a hard year or two years or three years, but you won't regret it. So hopefully this can be a reminder to you. When I talk about lateral steps, that's the sentiment I'm trying to recreate.

I think that's the great thing because it means the people who create, who build something meaningful, they've earned it. And that's what I tell myself every day. Earn that dream, earn that change. Take that road less travel. What you're doing right now is not insignificant simply because it's not immediately bearing free.

I think if you listen to this back from the top, you'll notice the constant theme, immediate, now, present. These things are delusioned. As far as results are concerned, the word immediately is a con artist. Action should be immediate, but results, no, they are gradual. They require persistence. Stick with it. Remind yourself to look up, because that's what you're after.

It's a pursuit. building a foundation, you're creating the things that permanently alter the artistic and political and social landscapes. That's remarkable. It's the road few have the patience to walk. Remind yourself why you're skipping the small stuff, brushing off the little winds and losses. Why building something substantial in silence is more powerful than gloating and screaming at the top of your lungs after every visible step. Look up. Reminds yourself that you are going to change. the world and you can see it. Ready to prioritize yourself in the new year, your skin is a great place to start.

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With thousands of glowing five-star reviews and a loyal community, the results speak for themselves. Revive your skin and give yourself the routine refresh you deserve by visiting Dimebeauty's CO. That's dime beauty co.com. Your best skin awaits. Hey there, it's Ryan Crest for Safeway. Now through February 25th, stock up on your favorite self-care items and save up to $3 shop in store or online for items like Old Spice Deodorant, always ultra-thin pads, Gillette Fusion Razors and Refills, Old Spice Total Body Spray, Tampax Pearl, and Jolette

Mach 3 Razors and Refills and Save Up to $3. You won't want to miss out on these deals. Offer ends February 25th. Offers may vary. apply. Visit safeway.com for more detail. There's a saying that will always be true. It will be true on your best days and your worst. It will be true after victory and it will be true after defeat.

It will be true when you have momentum and it'll be true when you're down on your luck doing everything in your power to create momentum. That saying is your future begins now. Hey, on the surface might not seem like much. Sure, my future starts now. I know that. Everyone knows that. Well, if that's true, if everyone does, in fact, know that,

why do we spend so much time stuck, reliving our past, unable to break free? Why do we remain terrified to change? Why do we feel such a connection to who we were, how others saw us? Why must we remain loyal to the character we've been proud? playing in our mental autobiographies. See, here's the thing about the past and the future. One is fixed, can't be changed, and the other, well, it's waiting for you to tell it what it is.

One is expired time. One is planned to be determined. And it's interesting how we continue to conflate the two. Epicetus has said that the more things we value outside of our control, the less control we have. Well, I'm going to be the messenger here relaying the precious truth that yesterday is in fact out of our control. What can be controlled is where we go from here, the next step. Meaning today is not your failures.

It's where you take those lessons. It's not your mistakes. But it's what the stronger you can now endure because of them. It's not the dreams you let slip away. but where your pursuit might take you now. And yeah, yesterday certainly contributes to your outlook, as all information does. It's value considered, its impact assessed. It guides you, but it's not you.

And that difference is astronomical. There's a question about the role the past plays in our lives. That has to mean something, right? Your past is, in many ways, your story. It's why you think the way you do. It's contributed to your understanding of the world. It will always be a part of you, and I believe that. But I also believe the past is a story.

And just like reading one chapter in a book simply sets the stage for the next one without controlling its direction, so does every day that has led you up to now. Life gives us the tools to experience, to grow, learn, and then shed that which does not coincide with what important your failures are not you but they are precious and that they push you towards what you'd like to be see you can experience something and not be that

thing as Kirkaggart says if you label me you negate me if you proclaim me to be X you're essentially stealing from me the infinite possibility that is the future yesterday has nothing to do with what I can become. And so taking it a step further, never mind being labeled by someone else. How could you label yourself and see it as anything but self-sabotage? See, you're never defined by your past, but always learning from it. It's not who you are.

It's the cheat codes for what you can be. Without that winding road of misfortune and mistakes, the incredible expansion we long for doesn't materialize. Imagine if everyone who ever felt down in life felt like a loser who temporarily lost hope. Imagine if they looked in the mirror and said, okay, this is who I am now. There would be no triumph in the world because anything meaningful requires the resiliency to map our way from the hell that was our darkest moments to what will become our proudest moments. Destiny. Destiny, destiny means that you separate the finite from the infinite. What you used to call yourself has prepared you to move towards the horizon.

But what you used to call yourself is also as irrelevant now as those seconds that you watch tick away. Seconds that maybe you're not proud of. seconds that perhaps taught you about the world, seconds that gave you a glimpse of what's possible, unveiled the happiest of times, all of it. In its own unique way, it brought value, but none of it is your future. Why?

Because back to that beautiful, all-powerful sentence, your future begins now. Your destiny is always Destiny is awaiting its marching orders and all you have to decide as you stand today is where that ship will sail. There's a quote attributed to H. Jackson Brown Jr. He says, Nothing is more expensive than a missed opportunity. I tend to agree with this. I also think it's interesting that these missed opportunities are also the most difficult, if not impossible, to quantify. So if you think about our common understanding of progress or growth, it's a sacrifice.

It's doing X brings us Y, doing the work, gets the result. It's a simple formula, and you can show your proof, you can work backwards. I started working out one hour a day, six months ago, this is what I look like now. The cost was one hour a day, the result, well, this is what I look like now. But what's the inverse of that thinking? What's the cost of not doing the work or starting the journey or taking the steps? See, we don't think about that. We don't think about the opportunity cost.

Our instinct is not to question the actions we don't take. I was listening to an old lecture from Jim Rohn, who I love because he's such a practical thinker. He's got ideas you can literally plug right into your life. And he had an amazing point. He was talking about a conversation with an old friend in which he asks his friend who apparently watches a lot of TV. He says, hey, what does that TV cost? His friend says, well, I think it's like $500. Jim says, no, I don't think so.

His friend says, yeah, I bought it, $500. He says, no, I think it's costing you about $40k a year. Why? Well, not because of what he paid for the item, but because of the opportunity cost. what his time using that TV could be reallocated to that's what's so incredible about that point it's like just because you don't have something doesn't mean you aren't in fact losing out on it

time is our most precious of commodities its utilization is the gateway to transformation it should be protected and you know the intent of the message is not to walk around panicking about every second you know of every minute, but more being aware, holistically, how recklessly we use our time. I don't know if you've ever looked at the screen time usage on a cell phone before going to bed at night. It's terrifying. Some of it was necessary, but I mean, a lot of it wasn't. And what does that cost? What is two hours

a day of not moving towards a dream or goal cost you? What about when it accumulates? And it becomes 14 hours a week, or roughly 56 hours a month, or times 12, 672 hours a year. I mean, these numbers start to get eye-opening. All it takes is a little awareness, and we see how often we dispose of time, like it's valueless. Everything we do is a cost, because in doing it, we are making a decision to not be doing something else with that time. And again, I believe in balance. I want to emphasize that. I'm not suggesting that we walk around like robots,

clocking in, clocking out, checking boxes so that we don't ever waste a minute, right? As the great Keith Urban says, the best days of my life for all that wasted time, you know, we should explore and enjoy and love and laugh and experience life. But that awareness makes us more intentional with those pursuits. With our work time and our playtime,

It forces us in a way to prioritize, to ask ourselves what we want. Instead of only looking at progress like this vending machine where you put an X and Y comes out, well, we can ask ourselves, what happens if I don't put an X? What happens if I keep it in my pocket? What won't come out? What could have existed that now won't? See, just because you don't see something slipping away, that doesn't mean that it isn't. And the immediate, the world in front of you, unfortunately, won't remind you of that.

That's a bell you have to ring yourself. You have to peel back the what am I doing and unveil the what could I be doing, what could I be creating, what could reality look like? Maybe you think about it and you find that you're right where you want to be, and that's great. Maybe you realize you've accepted a tolerable existence at the expense of an ideal existence. In which case, I also have great news. You can change that and you can change it now. We have to understand that you don't only have what's in front of you. You also possess a reality unseen and undiscovered.

So don't let the former cover up or diminish the latter. Don't lose the possibility of tomorrow with the distractions of today. Don't forget the cost of inaction with regard to those things that truly matter. matter. Ready to prioritize yourself in the new year? Your skin is a great place to start. Dime Beauty, founded by a master aesthetician, is more than just a

skincare company. With four skin conscious categories, skin care, beauty, body care, and fragrance, Dime offers simple, spa-worthy products that will help you enter 2025 with confidence. Whether you're revitalizing your regimen with nourishing products or building one from scratch, Dime makes

it easy. The work system are all-in-one best-selling routine, includes a cleanser of your choice, toner, serums, and moisturizers, taking the guess work out of skin care for your healthiest, happiest skin yet. Dime's commitment to clean ingredients and sustainable packaging ensures every product is as gentle on your skin as it is on the planet. With thousands of glowing five-star reviews and a loyal community, the results speak for themselves.

Revive your skin and give yourself the routine refresh you deserve by visiting Dimebeautcom. That's Dimebeautcom. best skin awaits. Hey there, it's Ryan Sechrest for Safeway. Now through February 25th, stock up on your favorite self-care items and save up to $3.00, shop in store, or online for items like Old Spice Deodorant, always ultra-thin pads, Gillette Fusion Razors and Refills, Old Spice, Total Body Spray, Tampax Pearl, and Gillette Mach 3 Razors and refills and save up to $3. You won't want to miss out on these deals. Offer ends February 25th. Offers may vary. Restrictions apply.

Visit Safeway.com for more detail. I always believed that possibilities were infinite. But nothing was off limits. And so I collected in this box my plans. And man, I had such a full agenda. Right? If you look inside, you could see them. That one in the back, that was the plan I made to leave my job and start over. And there, that one, that was where I was going to be.

to build a better relationship with my sisters. That one, that was piano. I was going to learn to play piano. And that one, that's where I was going to move to a little cottage on the lake. I've always dreamed of seeing the sunrise over the water. And that's where I was going to start the business and begin a family. That's where I'd run my first marathon. But time slipped away and plans seem to accumulate.

The box became more and more full. And I started to realize that it was simply a holding pattern for a life I wasn't living. These little plans were IOUs, kept in a box to remind me what was real and what was not. Maybe I missed the point. So I put down the box, slid it back under the bed, and I stepped out my foot. front door and little by little began piecing together that new life. The job, the city, the cottage by the lake, the piano, the new relationships. I immersed myself in the detail. And what I saw was a life changing in front of me, not because of plans, but because I moved

forward without them. As the saying goes, if you wait for the perfect moment, you will be waiting for the rest of your life. While the things you want most, they remain tucked neatly away on a shelf, gathering dust, evolving into could-bees or wood-haves. So now I keep that box empty, facing my bed, so when I wake up every morning, I remind myself to leave nothing for someday. 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, all the time.

brings you where you need to be. But more, my concern is the steps never brought to pay. My ideas on the hatch, 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, their 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 curveballs 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 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 because you said them out loud

you don't allow yourself to be vulnerable you forfeit your greatness if you don't risk failure you have no shot at being the one who makes statement. You don't risk them laughing at you, you have no shot at them clapping for you. If you don't risk trading today for a future outcome that's uncertain, you'll never know the fortune that that future help. Yeah, being vulnerable, it's difficult. It's hard, it hurts, but it has to. It's the ocean that separates what you have from what you want. The mountain that stands between who you are and who you want to be. Being vulnerable, it means you stop looking at what can go wrong and you start thinking about what can go right.

Because every question is a double-edged sword. Do you release that song? Because it could flop, but it will also kickstart your dream. Do you make that first trip to the gym? Because you'll probably look like you have no clue what you're doing, but it could also lead you to feeling better about yourself than you ever have before. Do you apply for that promotion? Because you could be let down. But it could also lead to a career transformation. Do you see the dynamic here? Every major decision comes with risk, and that's why people avoid making them. Standing out, taking the road less traveled, they shake our deeply rooted desire to fit in, right at the foundation.

They can flick like fire and water. See, so much of our stress comes from a need to belong, to preserve a reputation, to be cool. You want a fun experiment? Watch how fast being cool turns into mediocrity. It's doing the things that are not cool over and over again, the constitute greatness, the ones who are different, bold, out there, they change things.

The ones who are okay being called irrational, okay being laughed at, okay with failing and not getting it the first time around. If you do not let yourself be vulnerable, you never experience failure on a significant level. You don't fail, you don't learn, you don't learn, you don't grow. And if that's the case, forget about the top of the mountain. Safety, comfort of flawless reputation,

gets you a nice seat at the bottom looking up at greatness, at those who saw the opportunity and were willing to take a chance. So while you climb, keep your eyes on that big picture, remember that we outgrow our worries. Through each stage of our lives, we look back and we realize that our previous priorities were misaligned. We worried about things that didn't matter, allowed our decisions to be guided by variables that were irrelevant.

And that's the beauty of risk. It escalates this realization. Pushes further and further past the little things that mean less and less with each step taken. Your mistakes will not matter. Criticism from strangers will not matter. What will matter is whether you took control and did something meaningful with your life. Whether you followed your heart and your instant. And I know it's hard.

But I know it's uncomfortable. I can't sit here and guarantee the path will be paved out in gold. Everything will go how you want. But I can promise this. You will learn. You will adapt and move forward. I can promise that the critics and the naysayers get smaller and smaller until they fade out of the picture altogether.

And most importantly, I can promise that if you don't do anything, you will not go anywhere. And that is the only way to fail. So trust yourself. Trust the process. Believe that you are extraordinary. And go make your magic. Apologizing. Stop apologizing for who you are,

what you believe and how you see the world. Stop apologizing for your failures. They lift you up. they push you to be more. Stop apologizing for being different, unusual or unique. There's just saying that if you are lucky enough to be different, don't ever change, embrace that. Hold it. Stop apologizing for taking a path less traveled, for breaking away from the pack.

It's not an insufficiency. It doesn't mean you couldn't go their way. go their way. It means you have the courage to be yourself in a world trying to make you someone else. Stop apologizing for words that don't align with someone else's ideology or worldview. Your job isn't to appease or conform. It's to grab hold of what lights a fire in you and use it to brighten the world around you. Stop apologizing for your dreams. It's okay to not be content where you are. It's okay to want to grow, to become more. The roots planting them to the ground, they are not yours. And why waste the opportunity beyond the horizon of your current existence?

See, having the courage of your convictions is like unlocking your mind. Realizing that, yeah, you have the key and you've had it all along. No one else gets to set your parameters. They don't get to tell you what's right or what to believe. The people around you are not moral arbiters. They're not protectors of truth. Remember that. Remember that no one knows better than you what's best for you.

That's why there's power and intuition. In following your beliefs, your strengths, in doing what makes you happy, relentlessly pursuing what makes you feel alive. The thing about dreams, ideas, potential, they're always meaningless until they're not. See, everything is crazy until it exists. So protect it. Don't bow down to the pressures of now simply because you have not yet built tomorrow. You will. If you want it, you will. Some messages, they are incredible. simple and this my friends is one of those you have everything you need to become who you want to be

right now as you listen to this in real time you don't need approval or permission or acceptance you don't need to belong or be told it's normal you simply need to start to know that you will pick yourself up when you fall and keep going not apologize but continue placing one foot in front of the other. Not look externally for a will to carry on that only exists within you. See, the second you begin rewriting the rules, changing the game, you put yourself in position to emerge victorious.