Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - Do you feel stuck or lost? YOU'RE NOT ALONE - Motivational Speeches for Success

Episode Date: August 14, 2024

"In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity." — Albert Einstein Monday Motivation Newsletter: https://www.eddiepinero.com/newsletter Free Ebook: www.eddiepinero.com/ebook  YouTube: www.eddiepinero.com/youtube  In this episode, we explore the concept of the infinite and its impact on our perspective. When life feels overwhelming and you're stuck in a scarcity mindset, it's like being too close to a tree to see the forest. We'll discuss how to step back and gain perspective, revealing the abundance and solutions around you. Learn how to navigate life's challenges by shifting your mindset, finding new paths forward, and recognizing that sometimes the answers are simpler than they seem. Join me as we delve into how changing your vantage point can transform your journey.

Infinite means no bounds, which is kind of an abstract comment. Forever is difficult to grasp. But I want to explain to you why in my life it's prevalent in something I truly need right now in terms of a deeper understanding. And I'd be willing to bet that in some capacity, a better relationship with the word forever or infinite. would benefit your life as well. Let's drop into a very specific mental state.

See if it rings a bell, you know, that feeling of depletion, that feeling of being stuck or feeling lost, just total helplessness, you know, whether it's over a long period of time or sort of temporary helplessness. Whatever the context is, right? This feeling is a product of a scarcity narrative playing in your head.

Finitude. Amidst a forest of abundance, it's like staring at a tree from one inch away. All you see is that single fragment of tree bark. You don't see much. It looks pretty bleak. But then you take a step back and you go, okay, right? You see the shape of the tree. Go, I get it.

Take another step back, maybe two or three feet back. And you start seeing how these trees come together. You step back even further, you go, okay, I get it. All these trees comprise the forest. Maybe you continue to step back. You turn around, you see a totally different view, the landscape, the skyline, you see birds flying overhead. All that stuff that was always there, you just couldn't see it. Not from your vantage point, not that close to the tree.

which is going to be for us metaphorical for a problem or obstacle that we are immersed in or trying to overcome. There's an idea that there's no situation that cannot be rectified, right? Or put in the positive, every situation can be resolved. There's no hole you can't climb out of. There is always more. There is always a solution. And this little tidbit, you know, it might not mean much when you're feeling good. You have momentum. You know, the stars feel like they're aligned for you. But I'll tell you, it can be your saving grace when you are trudging through the valleys of life.

The inevitable, difficult periods. For me, it's been everything, right? It's reminded me that there is a way. I just need to find it. It reminds me that I'm capable of solving and conquering even life's greatest tasks. I just need to move into the night with conviction. I need to remember how close I am to that tree, right, and create some sort of separation there.

Because look, sometimes life is complex. You know, sometimes it's nuanced and in detailed. And then sometimes the opposite is true. Sometimes it is very simple. And one example of that is that, there is always a way and you are always capable of finding that way,

of arriving that solution. Understand that, and you'll see how abundant this dance through life really is. Truth is, personally, you know, sometimes the fear I experience, even about trivial things, just navigating life, it can hit hard. I think it's a visceral reaction, like involuntary.

It just, it happens. You know, podcast numbers dipping. Business deal falls through. Maybe a riff with a family member or friend. My brain walks right up to that metaphorical tree, stands there and says, hey, there's nothing you can do. This is it. This is the end.

You are stuck. You are lost. You are defeated. You are hopeless. You are all these things, and none of them are good. But what makes human being special is by understanding there is more, we empower ourselves to create more. We empower ourselves to step five feet back,

to see the forest, the view of the valley below. Don't settle in the finite. Dive into the infinity that surrounds you. You know, I think sometimes, you know, we become so pulled in to a specific problem or situation that it never even dawns on us to think, okay, you know, this is life, it happens, but you don't have to stay where you start. You are not confined to where you are. Because if it's not pushing you forward, it can be altered, mitigated, transformed. It's not an if question. Your assent is a how question.

And one of my favorite ideas, it states that, you know, many of life's greatest accomplishments were carried out by folks too ignorant to understand the odds. When you feel stuck, it's not because you are. It's because your human brain is in default mode. And it's like, no problem. Override. There's a way to turn every single predicament into a strength.

As Jim Rohn has famously stated, it's not the mountaintop that holds the value, it's who you become along the way to the mountain top. And that climb consists of a multitude of these seemingly dead ends. But in recognizing their inability to hold you back, yourself grow. You arm yourself with that knowledge. And to sum up, you know, the entire message here in its entirety, it's that in a world of infinite possibility, there is a way, right? I challenge you to find it. The same challenge I look in the mirror and present to myself when I feel stuck

or helpless or hopeless. I challenge you to look at your reality in a different light until the light bulb goes off and it's like oh this wasn't assigned to me I'm choosing this I'm creating this and as the architect of my own world I can recreate the story in its entirety you know people just don't go around in life telling us that it's not normal to hear hey buddy you have more control than you think you do hey you're accepting some things that You don't need to accept. Hey, step back, five more feet and build again from a different angle, right? Just like all the money in the world doesn't do much good,

stacked up in a warehouse that's never touched or utilized, you know, all the opportunity doesn't matter if you can't see it. If you're blinded by the tree, the downside, the limitation, none of that means anything. If your vantage point is one of confinement, infinity is always there. So step back, turn around, and walk directly into it. Use the resources to build reality, not as it is, but as you want it to be, a world on your terms. I'm going to take a second and thank the sponsor of today's podcast episode.

pro-compression. Coined the best compression socks you'll ever wear, they're a big part of my running, my lifting, as well as my recovery. For those unfamiliar with compression socks and the value that they bring to your fitness journey, they're known for a few things. One, alleviating swelling and soreness after a workout,

boosting blood flow, energy, and also enhancing performance and recovery. So being as into fitness as I am, become a big part of my routine, and I'm happy to pass that along to you guys. They're currently offering 40% off their entire website if you use the code EP40. The website is pro-compression.com, and again, that's code EP40. We have so much to let go of. To dismiss.

Ideas, narratives. They're not ours. Not in our best interest anyway. Yet we carry them around. Carry them around like we're perpetually tied to the lies they espouse, the fiction they propagate. We have to let go. Before we add a single thing, before we adopt another way, it all has to go. I don't remember where I've seen it, but I know I have.

maybe cartoons when I was younger, but I'm imagining that character that is taking off their jacket or shirt, and there's always another one underneath it. And they're like confused, frantically pulling off shirts and more and more keep emerging. They had no idea how many layers they were carrying around with them. And funny enough, 20 years later, I'd be thinking that we are no different. There are so many layers and so many of them should be gone, should be left, should be left, confined to the dust bin of history. Those boundaries in your life.

Who set them? Who said this is as far as you can go? Who put that little fence around your world and ask that you stay obediently confined to its borders? Who said that what you have is all there is? Who said upside is too dangerous? Who said life is about predictable. ability and routine, so stop asking questions.

No one. No one said those things. So hey, there's a start. Empty your pockets of the boundaries that are making life heavy. What about yesterday? Might as well take off that backpack, tip it upside down, and pour out the yesterday. You made mistakes yesterday. Ah, but that's not today.

You didn't like certain aspects of who you were yesterday. But that's not today either. Your friends, maybe family, maybe others in your life knew you to be someone. Someone you don't think you are or someone you wish you weren't. Well, more breaking news, that was yesterday. Did you even realize you're still carrying around who you were yesterday on your back, your next step has a lot to do with now and very little to do with yesterday. So embrace and wave goodbye to those calendar pages you've already turned.

That's the best move for everyone. Oh, and those concessions you make, you didn't think I'd forget those. You can't forget those. Unshackle them from your ankle. Those things you say, eh, you're not ideal. but it's easier to live a lesser life with you in it than it is to go through the trouble of pushing you away. Perhaps the people that darken your light,

the actions that you know are not you, the time exhausted living for someone else, gone, gone and gone, it has to go. And look, we all know life is tricky. It's hard to walk away from things so ingrained into our daily lives for so long. But let's play a game. Let's pretend it was.

Pretend life was that simple. Things I need to leave behind. A, B, and C. Well, that's definitely simple. Perhaps not easy, but simple. And now, through this simplified lens, you have a target to aim for. Something to chip away at. You have your block of marble.

Now comes the process of chiseling a little bit at a time. And that's the goal. Because to not carry these things ends up meaning everything. Space no longer occupied by the wrong things creates space for the right things. Knocking down what doesn't belong creates a platform to build what does. So onward, we must go, not falling into the trap of pointing at externalities, blaming the world for our confinement. But instead understanding that we have been,

perhaps without even realizing it, taking our confinement with us, in our pockets, on our back, trailing behind our every step, a subtle resistance. And when it goes, we can finally grow. We can become more. So what can you do now to live a life that's more meaningful, that's more true to yourself? Well, you can see.

Start by doing less of what weighs you down. Time waits for no one. Look, the Earth will continue to spin, the sun to set, clocks to tick. There are no perfect moments, only moments, waiting to be interpreted by those passing through them. And as a raindrop in this thunderstorm, an actor in this play, the only rations of the only ratcheworthand, rational question in my mind is if time will not wait, why should I? If time will continue its steady march, why let it leave me behind?

I'm in my mid-30s, and here's what I've already seen. I've already seen songs I grew up with, referred to as classic rock. I've seen some of my childhood sports heroes struggle to throw a first pitch before a baseball game. I've seen a substantial portion of my social interaction become digitized. I've seen once forever people in my life fade away and become memories. I've audibly laughed at the ridiculousness of things that at one point I was sure were important. I've redefined the meaning of the word home in my life more times than I can count. In fact, the way I see the world and the way I see myself operating, and it continues to change.

As the saying goes, the only constant in our lives is that things change, evolve. Why does this matter so much to me? Well, because when I look back, the single thing that would consistently keep me from truly pushing that pedal to the floor to truly capturing all life has to offer was a fear, a very specific fear. of losing what I had at that moment. I was scared to death of loss, as we all tend to be to varying extent. In fact, we're biologically wired

to respect the fear of loss to a greater extent than the prospect of acquisition. There's humor in all this, though, a deeply rooted irony. It emerges when we discover that we lose everything. It all goes. The song that's playing ends for each and every one of us.

And is this a sad thing? No. No more than the credits to your favorite movie rolling after the final scene. It was the show, the experience that meant the world. It's a beautiful thing if you let it manifest in all its beauty. If you move along with it, immerse yourself in its brilliance. My point is that the only way to lose is to win. It's to not realize that you're starring in your own cinematic masterpiece,

and those credits will at some point roll. It's to sit in a chair on the side of the gym while the rest of the room dances. Life is finite, and the power is not in a flawless existence. It's an understanding to our core, that there is nothing to lose, that the window is small, that we should carry out the human equivalent of a fireworks show. We should be obnoxiously bold, absurdly courageous.

We should go, live, try, experiment, explore, build, create. And yeah, sometimes you'll fail. and sometimes you'll fail spectacularly, but sometimes you'll triumph. And along the way, the mistakes, they become wisdom. They become courage. Both of which are integral to any meaningful grand finale. And as I make my way around the sun for the 36th time, the priority is to remember that the,

These rides are not forever. They are precious. And that I have the strength to live accordingly. Fearlessly, courageously, my hope is that you find it within yourself to do the same. To pull back the curtains and see now that failure was never the adversary, no, not even close. The adversary is an unwillingness to make the most of your moments. The adversary is freezing amidst the constant hammering away of ticking clocks. The adversary is the prospect of removing failure's mask years down the road, only to

stare directly into the eyes of regret. These outcomes constitute your greatest adversary. So for the sake of all that is meaningful, go push into the questions and the risk and the curiosity that makes life worth living. After all, it is not about failure. It's about time. It's been almost two years since I first read it. And still the main idea from the book, The Courage to be Disliked by Ichiro Kishimi

deeply resonates with me. The idea that being happy is essentially dependent upon the courage to be disliked. And at first, it might not seem like the two, you know, whatever be related. Happiness and being disliked. An odd pair.

Maybe even seemingly counterintuitive. Until you realize that happiness comes from such a personal, authentic place that allows, Knowing the expectations of others to chart your course means that you'd probably never arrived there. You have to do what's best for you. And doing what's best for you is going to create a divide somewhere.

Why? Because everything creates a divide. Everything is subjective. I knew I wanted to dive into this topic, but wasn't sure the best way to do it. So the other morning I was trying to think of like an objective, something that no one could disagree with. It was sitting on my balcony and pointed up towards this sky. I thought, let's start there. Simple as it gets, hard to refute that, right? I am pointing up.

And I remembered we're floating on a globe, a giant sphere. There is no up. Up is perspective. Everything is perspective. What's the difference between one and two? Some might say it's one. But technically, there's a difference. But technically, there's infinity between one and two. You can have infinite decimals.

1.999 goes on forever, right? Point being there's subjectivity when we drill down into even the seemingly obvious truth. Now, the value here is not to go running around, arguing with everyone that there's infinity between one and two. No, there's certain aspects of society that we must adhere to, otherwise we couldn't function together, right? But it's simply to show that you following the path you believe is right for you

cannot be rightfully assessed by someone else. It's to place trust in your internal personal judgment. And when people don't understand your infinity, that doesn't mean it's wrong. And by the way, I don't have blinders on to the fact that it's hard to do. In many ways, it goes right up against our lizard brain biological wiring, right? We're fitting and equates to survival and ostracization becomes a death sentence, but we are, fortunately, beyond that. It's in our interest now, and in fact, I think the courage to be disliked is a critical lifelong journey. I'm better at this than I was 10 years ago, no question, but do I still have a ways to go?

Absolutely. There are still things I'm working on every day to let go of. I remember reading in Jefferson's biography about how it was so hard for him to be demonized in the press all the time that it almost dissuaded him from jumping back into politics before his presidential run. And being attacked is a hard thing. But ultimately, he let his beliefs and personal values

drive him, his ambition in a lot of ways, and came to see the scrutiny as a cost, decided it was worth the price. Or like I use this all the time, take one of the biggest pop stars of our day, say Justin Bieber. You look at what people are saying about him in the comments of his video. A lot of it's wonderful, some of it's great, sure, but some of it's awful. And that's just the price of anyone putting themselves out there.

And again, you think of an inverse scenario. Imagine if he didn't. Imagine if he limited himself or didn't dive fully into what he does because he knew some folks out there would have some bad things to say. Now, we are, for the most part, neither famous politicians nor pop stars, but our worlds contain the same elements at different scale. There are things we're all scared to do or say because of how it will be received. There are parts of ourselves that we repress because we don't know what the feedback will be.

We're all scared to fail in some capacity because of how it will look or what others will say about it, which is why being disliked is courageous. As Aristotle has said, the only way to avoid criticism is to do nothing, to say nothing and be nothing. The opposite of being fully, truly yourself is becoming the manifestation of that quote. It's never pushing yourself. Never seeing what you're capable of, never exploring or executing on your dreams, your ambitions. Now, this is speculation, but if I were a gambling man, I'd place everything I own on the idea that, when we're old, looking back on our lives, we'll spend less time thinking about who criticized us or disagreed with us than how we spent our days and who we shared them with.

Did we live in a way that made us happy that was meaningful? Because on a sphere, everyone believes they are pointing up. But in actuality, none of us are. We're all merely navigating the subjective universe behind our eyes. So why not truly explore? Why not capture the magic out there before the hourglass runs out of sand? It's hard, sometimes it hurts, it takes. all we have, it requires courage.

But I think we'll all come to find that the decision to live fully in our authenticity, regardless of whether others agreed, disagreed, or were indifferent, was the best decision that we ever made. Even if there were a magic box, with the answer to every, single question imaginable inside. You'd still have to know what questions to ask it

in order to take anything worthwhile away. The output is only going to be as valuable as the input. But why won't the world just give me what I want? Why can't I have something new? Why won't life grant me a fresh start? Well, the question worth reflecting upon is what are you doing to prompt the change? What are your inputs?

The jukebox only plays the song you select. What are you selecting? And I say this, well, I say this because my expectations are sometimes inclined to diverge from the actions that I take. There can be a gap between what I want and what I'm actually spending my time doing.

A gap that without a gap that, the necessary time and attention widens. But what we want to do is close that gap. We want to take the ideal on one side and the reel on the other and squeeze them as close together as possible. That requires, though, that you recognize and take control of your input. A friend of mine in the medical field and I were talking about weight loss, not too long ago. And something he said that stuck with me. He says, yeah, weight loss can be complex.

There's certainly variability. But there's a simple underlying truth to all of it. If you burn more calories than you take in through eating, your body will lose weight. It's inevitable. You're creating a deficit. Simple. Your input controls your output. We can move to personal finance, something everyone can relate to. If you spend less than you make, you'll have money left over to save. Again, personal finance also has its nuance. There are certainly plenty of variables. But this piece will always be true.

If you want to increase your savings, you can either make more or spend less. Your decisions here, your inputs here, will dictate your output. And so I think it's worth calling our attention to those things we're doing day in and day And I'm talking about the most basic of things. Are they contributing to what you want most or not? That's why I reference my whiteboard list so often, right? Incredibly simple, which I think is what we need. One column on the left is your goals, you know, the things that you want.

The other column on the right is what you're doing to bring about what you want. What are your actions? And if you make that list and notice that your days wildly deviate from that list, there's a problem. Either you're wasting your time with meaningless action or you've selected the wrong goals. You can wildly change the results you get

by tweaking the actions you make or inputs as I've called them here. Here's an example. This is an adversary. I've been dancing around for a decade now. I have injury problems. Talk about it all the time. left ankle, right knee, left elbow, right shoulder.

I'm constantly working around these things until inevitably something happens and I have to take a step back and rest and rehab it, right? What did I do? I saw a physical therapist. Definitely a valuable input, but not enough. I'm consistently working on my diet. Valuable input, but again, not enough.

Hydration, right? Gallon of water a day. valuable input but not enough. I decided not too long ago to take yoga seriously, like be obnoxiously serious about it. I'm going almost every day, and I think I don't want to speak too soon, but I think I'm seeing something that I haven't seen in a decade.

I feel good, and I'm able to do some weight training that previously I really couldn't. You know, the output here is finally starting to look like I want it, to look. But here's the thing, right? It's been so frustrating over the years. Like I get so angry with the situation that I forget that I have control over the outcome. It just seems like when you've exhausted so much time and energy, like it's beyond you. And it's like, no, there are still your inputs creating your outputs and you can continue to change those things. Don't stop trying testing.

You know, and that's really it. And I mean, this is such a basic concept. It's so almost painfully simple. But as I like to say, you know, the wheels don't fall off the wagon when we get the minor details wrong. No, it's when we're getting the basic things wrong. That's when we lose ourselves. That's when we fall off track. And that simple input and output idea is amazing to me.

Because it waters all that seemingly complex. stuff down into the simple. It puts the power in our hands to do something about it. Even when it's frustrating, even when we feel like we've exhausted all our options, no, there's always more. Why? Because you put something in, you get something out. If you don't like what's coming out, change what's going in.

You are your own experiment. You are responsible for closing that gap between the real and the ideal. If the people you're spending your time with don't make you feel good or bring you down, adjust the input. If you aren't happy with your financial situation, adjust the inputs. If you aren't happy with your physique or overall health, adjust the input. If your business or platform or personal brand isn't evolving the way you'd like it to, stop blindly repeating what you're doing day in and day out and adjust the inputs. The real world results will change right in front of your eyes.

Not because anything was given to you, but because your persistence, your adaptability, and your commitment to growth demanded it. I put on my shoes, stepped outside, and as I made my way down the street for my midday run, I felt the wind at my back, tailwind. My first thought, well, nice, this is convenient. Especially running along the beach where it can be pretty windy.

It's definitely a luxury to have wind at your back. Sure enough, my mind went, oh, but that leaves me a headwind when I turn around and come back up the coast. My mind started to wander. I started imagining what it was going to be like turning around at that 6.6 mile mark. I was doing a half marathon that day and knew that the way back would require that I level up

and every once in a while the thought popped into my head sort of reminding me of the inevitable and sure enough the moment arrived the sun pressing down onto my skin the humidity wrapped around me like a blanket I hit 6.6 miles turned around on A1A and there was that headwind But the first thing I noticed was not the force pushing back against me.

No, in that moment, I felt the breeze, the coolness. It was refreshing. And there, underneath it all, was my light-bald moment. What we are presented with day in and day out is a question. It's a choice. Would the wind become my adversary? Something that, yeah, pushed me forward on the way down, but then held me back on the way up?

Or would it be what pushed me forward on the way down and then cooled me off as I made my way up? And if you think that mental alteration or perspective shift is just nuance or too small to matter, I suggest you give it a go when you're doing whatever your equivalent of total exertion is, whatever your mental stressor is that pushes you beyond your state of usual comfort.

When you're in the middle of, let's call it hurt, whether it be physical activity or a personal situation entirely unrelated to athletics, how are you internalizing the world around you? It's become clear to me over time that winning during our most trying moments comes down to mental shifts so small that they seem almost laughable in normal conditions. But your mind will always stop you before life. well. So why not put yourself in a position to win? Everything around you is trying to help you in some capacity. Allow that to be the case. Remember that what you look for you'll find. So if you look for

resistance and obstacles and adversaries, they'll be everywhere. But if you look for and seek out value, you'll see that you're surrounded by nothing but value. Even though, you're not, even though metaphorical headwinds become hands reaching out working to cool you off as you make your way to greater things so understand that when they arise those headwinds the ones that typically hold you back they hide within them small winds small winds that will be the difference the deeper one descends into chaos the more important it is to find those victories, the ones hidden in plain view, the ones that look to many like problems, but you'll know. You'll know just how malleable this world around us is.

The world seems to provide not definitive but tools. So which will you pick up? What will you build with them? See, life is never happening to you. It's happening for you. So keep your eyes open, keep your feet moving, and remember that you will win, not despite the headwinds of life, but because of them. Because you've trained yourself when those around you see can't and won't to find a way, to pull from the chaos, the very thing you need most. Life gives you the canvas. But you are the one who is. must paint. Mark Twain said the two most important days of your life are the day you were born and the day you find out why. The first gets you into the show and the second asks what will

you do with your time here? What will you make of this sunrise? Because we only get so many And I think there's immense value in understanding that each and every one of us are here to leave this place better than we found it. To stand up when we could be sitting down, step out, and make something of the chaotic and often hard to understand world around us. When you realize the miracle that is your existence, when you understand the almost impossible odds of you being, here, thinking, feeling, breathing in the air around you, you begin to see the value of today. Because it's not an obligation, it's a currency, the most precious of commodities. Today is your time to step into that new version of yourself, to see something more so that you can begin the process of creating. something more because the truth is life will always be what you decided is if you

walk up to your window look through the blind and decide what you see is the finale the final script that's exactly what it will be but if you see right now as a beautiful beginning the initiation of the ride of a lifetime a transport to the next version of you and the next and the next then you are signing up for a world without limit. A world where you can feel what it's like to be tested and endure. To be lost, but finds your way. To build something meaningful out of the seemingly meaningless.

That's why you're here. That's what it means to truly live. Today is your day. Your chance. Don't let it slip away from. you don't be fooled into thinking it's less than it really is it is your ticket to infinity a journey that starts when you decide it does when you look out at that vast unknown and say I'm not going to settle for anything less than a life of

adventure I want the challenges the turbulence the losses and the battles they will bring me to a place I could never have arrived at otherwise you get from life what you give So give it all. Leave no path unwalk, no stone unturned. Today is the most important day of your life because it will connect the you of yesterday to the limitless you of every day that comes next.

In a way, the world is a mirror that reflects how you feel. And if life is consistently mirroring back images, that aren't ideal. Perhaps it's time to chip away, not at the world, but at yourself. It's time to work. And sometimes, that's roll up your sleeves

and be better work. Let's get up a little bit earlier work. It's at the gym, or study, or give more work. But sometimes it's acknowledging that if in this chapter of your life, You find everything around you intimidating or too distant or out of reach. It's not because the world is too big, but rather you've let your own image get too small.

It's the identity that needs the maintenance. We do things because we see ourselves as doers of those things, right? Soccer players play soccer. Writers write, painters paint. No one who's ever identified or introduced himself as a runner. has ever broken a world deadlift record. No, runners do runner things. Bodybuilders do bodybuilder things.

People who view themselves as small do small things and people who see themselves as capable or strong, daring, adventurous, larger than life, well, you get the point. We're out there over-analyzing all these details, trying to decipher code without realizing that we've already won or lost. You gave yourself permission to run 50 yards

and then became Sherlock Holmes trying to figure out why the world wouldn't let you reach yard 51. We go as far as we allow ourselves to go. We do as much as we allow ourselves to do. We become who we allow ourselves to be. And I'm not saying the other variables don't matter. Of course they do. I'm saying over time those variables become blocks

for us to build ourselves up or build walls around ourselves. that keep us down in one place. If the world feels bland, give yourself permission to seek out the beauty. Be someone who finds joy in life. If the world feels lonely, give yourself permission to connect with others.

Be someone who brings people together. If the world feels chaotic and confusing, give yourself permission to break it down. Be someone who turns big things into small, manageable things. things. If the world feels sad and disheartening, give yourself permission to uncover what makes you smile. Be someone who in the darkness of night can find that light switch. Because for every reason to be sad, there's one to be happy. For every reason to be weak, there's one to be strong, so on and so forth. Of course, it's not the easiest to remember when we look out and don't like

what we see. But knowing that the solution is internal, knowing that you're not, you know, You decide who you are, where you're going, and where you stop. As much as humanly possible, it puts fate in your hands, which is right where it should be. We spend a lot of time asking ourselves, what if things don't work out? What if I fall, fail, or miss the mark? What if I have to head home empty-handed?

Diminished pride, defeated. But what if we've simply been asking the wrong question? Imagine flipping this script. What if everything worked out better than you could have ever imagined? What if you learn in going that you have barely scratched the surface of your potential? That you've been accepting too little, leaving too much on the table? What if you learn that you are powerful beyond all recognition? Not because someone told you so.

No, but because the very steps being taken prove the point. What if the things that held you down can be dismantled, the thoughts that held you back can be demolished? Why is it? We don't ask more of those questions. Generally you get what you look for. What you ask of life is what you shall receive, or so the saying goes. So my thought here is perhaps we need to ask for more.

Not of the world but of ourselves. There's an ocean of opportunity before us, enough of this pointing out in wishing for more while we wade in water that is waste deep. First steps will always be believing that more exists. That the world might not be able to see it. It might not exist to your left or right, but it exists in your head and that is a enough. That is where all great accomplishments start. It's the necessary beginning. And to disregard a perceived outcome because it's only in your mind it hasn't materialized yet.

It's like disregarding a seed because it's not yet a tree. The two are forever intertwined. They need each other. Simple formula. See greatness and move towards that greatness. that greatness. Nothing else is relevant. And sure, you'll have your struggle from time to time, no question. But that's not failure. That's what happens along the path to better things. That adversity is simply the price that must be paid for dreaming, for taking the ideal and bringing it to life. And at the end of the day, that price is, a bargain. So ask yourself, what if things do work out? In fact, what if they work out better

than I ever imagine? What if the current norms can be transformed, reality, altered? What if this is just the beginning of the best life has to offer? You change the questions, you change the outcome, and today feels like the perfect day. For change. One of my favorite quotes is sometimes success is simply hanging on when others would be letting go. The reason is that it reminds me how frequently the advantage is in not stopping. It's in consistency. It's in showing up.

When I run particularly long distances, almost like clockwork I can break it down to feeling good at the beginning, usually a little rough stretch in the middle, and then somewhere on the second half, I catch a second wind or a second blast of energy. The question just becomes when? Will you hang in long enough to capture it? Because you don't know when it might be, where it will show up, you don't know when you'll find that nice rhythm again that makes the sport so enjoyable to me. And when I say, you know, you can pull an infinite amount of life lessons from running, this is one of them. A depiction of trusting that the road ahead has everything you need to cross your finish line. Even when the short-term chaos is all you can see and feel, even when it's hard to look up and imagine.

Because it's easier said than done when you're tired and worn down to continue on, right? When you're in the trenches. There's an uncertainty to the road ahead, but each footstep is a shot on target. Each step forward is saying, I'm worn down, but I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere. And life can present an almost eerily similar narrative, right, whether personally you're at a low point, whether you've been working and working and working and haven't seen the result you're looking for, whether you're uncomfortable and starting to wonder whether this reward is really worth the high price tag.

You need to remember that second wind, that second blast of energy, just enough momentum to ease your worry and recalibrate your journey. It's there. It's waiting. But you know the rules of life. It won't come to you. You must go to it. Through the storm into the night beyond the comforts of home, most sadly don't arrive.

Not because they couldn't, but because they ultimately let go. They looked too far down the road at the distance to be traveled and forgot that their only job was to hold on. Through the doubt, the pain, the worry, no miracle. Just a willingness to fight each battle as it presented. itself, to let time stack up, to let the distance over your shoulder accumulate. See, the thing about stopping is that you never know when that much needed second wind will arrive. There's a saying that many of life's failures had no clue how close they were to success

when they gave up, when they turned around. Now I'm not suggesting the road will be perfect, or that it won't come with its adversity, mistakes and lessons. But what we always have control over is the ability to push forward until we finally come face to face with that which we so desperately needed. It's there.

I could say it a million times and it wouldn't be enough. The pieces exist. Will you hang in long enough to collect them? When the road is intimidating, will you hold on? When you run into those moments of self-doubt, will you hold on? When you feel small, navigating the ups and downs of life, will you hold on? Because if the answer is yes, you'll find yourself crossing some finish lines that will blow your mind. You'll get from life that which most can only dream of.

And again, not because of the miraculous, but because you knew that the second wind was coming, you knew it would be there for you, so long as you kept moving forward. Holding on when most would be letting go. It may be that our greatest gift in life is that we're always one decision away from transformation. We're always one decision away from a new path. from a new path with new experiences, new beliefs, new identity, one decision away from a totally different life. It's almost incomprehensible. That all the days leading up to now, everything we knew ourselves to be can be discarded and left with one swing of an axe gone.

What is more miraculous than that? We live at the intersection of two imaginary worlds, right? The past and the future. The past is gone and essentially meaningless. Yet as the provider of our identity, it still rules over us. Our sense of who we are comes from our collection of past memories. That imaginary world of yesterday, like the elephant tied to the chair with a rope. It hasn't realized it's strong enough to break free. It doesn't know that what confines him is not the rope, but acceptance of a lie.

And that's what the past, that's what identity is, a lie. We are not yesterday, we are right now. And from the trivial things to the significant things, we get wrapped up in that lie. We overlook the gift of control we have over our future. What does it mean to say, I'm not a mourning person? That in your past, you hadn't conditioned yourself to wake up early? Okay. What does it mean to say, oh, I let people walk all over me?

that in your past you didn't stand up for yourself? What does it mean to say I'm awkward or shy or I struggle with writing or running or public speaking? So maybe you did. But what does that have to do with right now? What does that have to do with realizing the control you have over your life? Because simply realizing you can disconnect

from these narratives that they are not you is the superpower. Realizing that calling yourself a bad student because you failed a test. It's like never taking off your rain coat because it rained yesterday. It's like, no, the sun is out, adapt. And once you realize right now

is the beginning of the rest of your life, you can start making little changes. Identify not who you were, but who you'd love to be. And move towards it. Read the power of habit and atomic habit so that you can understand change isn't crazy or big or scary.

It's moving little things in your life around so that they work for you, not against you. Start waking up and thinking about not what has happened, but what can happen, not what can go wrong, but what can go right. You are always one decision away from a totally different life because you're always one decision away from change, from walking away from the narratives that you have accepted. And so remember that. But remember it not just when things are fine. Remember it when you're struggling, when you feel restless or uneasy, unsure, uninspired, sad, angry, not content with the reflection in the mirror. When you feel that negativity, you're not looking at what can be, you're looking at what you

have been. And there's no room at the table for that distraction. Not when you can reach out and start building something new. Not when you can put on a new pair of shoes and walk down a different path, you are always one decision away from a totally different life. And that decision should be first and foremost to choose future over past. Your next step over the last one, choose your ideal world and start building. Standing on that ledge, staring out at what we know we need to do. at the moment we least want to do it, well, that's where the future is shaped.

When procrastination feels like the answer or avoidance the optimal choice, where does one draw their strength? They say routine is a powerful tool in this fight. And I believe that when something becomes habit or part of the process instilled in the day-to-day, there's just simply less room for negotiation. We show up with our eyes on the prize. But here's the thing, we are human. There's simply going to be days when the world pushes back. Life is a game of complexity.

It's unpredictable. You want to talk about the good days, fine. It's easy to show up when we're feeling good. And thankfully, those days outnumbered. the others, creating the bulk of our consistency, 10,000 hours. But not all of them. Life is about momentum. Myself, after coming off a pretty terrible weekend for a variety of reasons, I found myself on that ledge again. When the alternative route made itself known, where it felt mighty tempting to call it off, take a break where my worldview had come into question.

I had to ask myself, who are you? Really? It's easy to rationalize walking away in these moments. In his book The War of Art, Stephen Pressfield says, our job in life is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we imagine we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it. Well, who would have known how much goes into that process of becoming? How committed we have to be to the road before us, and not only when it's sunny,

but when the skies are dark and gray. And how if we allow ourselves in those difficult moments to say, sometimes it's okay to wave the white flag. It's okay to walk away. Then you leave the door cracked to make that same decision at any other point in time. Quitting, conceding can very easily become a habit. And a habit we want to avoid at all cost. I have this little rule that no matter what, I can never leave dishes in the sink overnight.

Never. I treat this arbitrary little promise. to myself, like it's life or death. Which, again, random, but hear me out. It's half practical, half symbolic. I know that if I say, okay, just this once, I've effectively removed the barrier separating order from chaos. If it's okay just this once, then it's okay 1,000 times.

And a messy sink becomes a messy kitchen, becomes a messy house, becomes a cluttered mind. mind. Extreme, maybe, but critical. Here is where the symbolism comes in. I understand how fragile that divide, how when I'm tired or have a headache or I'm busy, it's still priority. Because I want to hammer my subconscious with the understanding that I show up when it's inconvenient. That very moment when, you know, I could easily trick myself into thinking it's small or dumb or arbitrary. It's a sink, who cares, right? That's the moment that I need to bleed into the rest of my life. And I think that's exactly it, right? The floodwaters are always looking to come in.

And how many cracks until the room gives way? You know, when you've had a few rough days, when you've lost something important to you, when you're sad or disappointed about it, outcome what then when life calls you to exceed expectations what then because the world around you will always give you evidence support dialing it back right selling yourself short if that's the case you're looking to make but here's the deal should you choose the inverse you are strong enough to be better than you've ever been in those challenging moments you can show up when it hurts You can reestablish your why and carry forward even after the turbulence of yesterday.

Life will never be easy. It will never all make sense. And this understanding has helped me to roll up my sleeves and continue forward. When I'm disappointed with yesterday, or overwhelmed by the conditions or landscape of the moment, when I question how much I have left. But I've found that when I look hard enough, there's always something to draw. And that's the message of note. That's what we must show ourselves. When you're on that ledge, this can be where you're at your best.

This is where you get to uncover just how deep-rooted your greatness is. This is where you set the standard and the pace. for everything to come. There's power and simplification. Not because you can't handle the complex, but because too much noise drowns out the meaning. It gets in the way of the things that actually make the difference. Our blessing and curse is the finitude of our time.

So by default, that makes the word, know a gatekeeper to the contentment we feel in our lives. What are you keeping out? What are you saving space for? Clarity is not a luxury, but a necessity. And when one has limited capacity, they must both cherish and protect it. So why does this matter? It matters because when you simplify things, the path is never as intimidating. The problem is never unsolvable, the opportunity is never too far away. It matters because we dress the solutions up in irrelevant detail and then call them the problem. We don't see things as what they are.

We see them as stories. We tell ourselves. We see too much. And it just so happens that the biggest leaps forward one can take in life or the result of not secret formulas or hidden answers, but in freeing ourselves of that excess, saying no to the wrong things so that we can say yes to the right things. Underneath the stacks and accumulation of nothing is something. There's something, too, the notion that the road to recovery is always a single decision away,

that it's already there. But you just haven't been able to acknowledge, to choose it, When life becomes convoluted, there's this tendency to think, I am the problem, I am broken, I am incapable of X or Y or Z. And it's like, no, you've just let so much in that what was once obvious is now buried. You're looking at the giant ocean before you, forgetting that a very tiny boat can traverse it. Basics. Let's ask the question, where is it I most want to go?

And what would one step in that direction look like? Sometimes we have to go knowing that mile 10 will have its monsters, and mile 50 will have its setback. But to not take step one in anticipation of those future problems, of something way down the road is letting that excess in. Simplicity is the goal. Simplicity. Ask yourself, can you start? Beginning grants you one of the greatest weapons to possess,

an ability to adjust, the ability to adapt, the ability to utilize the now. And this is not to dismiss the pain and difficulty associated with our most challenging times, it's to remind you that, during those times you feel lost or closed in you don't need to reinvent the world to your left and right it's not bigger than you so much of the time it's about composing yourself enough to reach out for the light switch that will illuminate

the path just enough for you to look up and walk right out The front door.