Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - Hold On: Overcoming Life’s Toughest Moments

Episode Date: January 27, 2025

The hardest challenges often feel impossible, but success often comes down to one simple thing: holding on when others let go. You don’t need magic or perfection—just consistency, small adjustments, and the willingness to face discomfort head-on. Growth isn’t easy, but it’s always worth it. This episode is a reminder that the pain you feel now is temporary, and every small step forward builds the strength to overcome. The key isn’t doing the impossible but staying steady through the storm. How will you keep moving toward the life you want? Monday Motivation Newsletter: https://www.eddiepinero.com/newsletter Free Ebook: www.eddiepinero.com/ebook  YouTube: www.eddiepinero.com/youtube 

Here's the key to conquering the vast majority of life's adversity. Quote, sometimes success is simply a matter of hanging on when others would be letting go. Why? Because when facing adversity, we overthink. We seek to pull out solutions far greater than they need to be. mere mortals thinking we need to perform miracles and defy laws of nature. No, couldn't be further from the truth, and here's why. Imagine a rope taut above your head, like a clothing line or zip line, that's the idea. Let's say eight or nine feet off the ground, and you, along with two others, jump up and grab it with both hands. You're all now hanging there, holding on tight, feet dangling.

Who can hold on the longest? At first, it doesn't feel like anything. It's easy. But then, you feel it. And when you feel it, you seem to feel it all at once. As though the floodgates opened and the discomfort came pouring in. An avalanche of, oh man, I don't want to be here. And that initial shock alone is enough for one of those with you to let go.

gone and then there were two. Holding tight. The game has now entered the realm of the psychological. Your mind is racing, scrambling, searching for off-rems. It's thinking about how much time is left. You're making micro adjustments, playing with the grip on the right hand,

then the left, back and forth. The pain has greatly intensified. This is now a game of sheer will. Not who can, but who wants it, More. Out of your periphery, you see the last remaining person grown and let go. And just like that, there was one. You alone. And you ask yourself as you let go and land on the ground.

What created the success, the victory, what brought forth the outcome? Consistency. adaptability holding on see this is how I view most meaningful pursuits it's not that most people couldn't the task is relatively straightforward it's that one

they've not embraced the discomfort and two they're asking more of themselves than required there's no magic trick that fixes or short tracks the hell you're in hanging from that line the objective is simply to hold, to be okay with your laughs and shoulders and knuckles burning, to know that it's not

forever. So make the little adjustments, grit your teeth, and know you're capable. And when you're in those moments, please hear me. Don't overcomplicate that, which is simple. To win is to not let go. It's to make the micro adjustments and alterations and situations and sense. Stay in the game. That's the goal.

Stay in the game. Keep fighting. Hold on. All this talk about other people being the problem. The world being the issue. Fate being the adversary. No. My friends, more often than not,

we take ourselves out of the game. We cripple ourselves and the opportunity before us. And I know it's not easy. I know it doesn't feel good. But here's the thing. It will. As was once said by Lance Armstrong, pain is temporary, but quitting is forever.

See, you hold on to that rope. You endure. There is an end point. However, you bow down and let go. Well, you get to carry that pain around with you for the rest of your life. That question, what if I just found a little more? What if I listen to my soul and not my racing mind?

You can endure the depths of hell. That's not the question. The question is, will you give yourself permission to? Will you open the gate and unleash your greatness into the world? Into a world that needs it, by the way. Because it's not a matter of going out and acquiring. It's a matter of simitimate. simply hanging on until it comes to fruition,

through the doubt, through the hardship, learning through the struggle, converting obstacles into opportunities, while most would be letting go. While most would be looking to their left and right and saying the cost is more than I'm willing to pay. If you want to change your life, if you want to change the world, that is the path.

It is the way. The question, when your mind screams, your heart races, and the ground seems to shape, can you, will you simply hold on? So the other day, I had a moment. I was walking out of Walgreens, just grabbed some stuff, was, you know, moving through the parking lot. And I paused for a brief second and just looked at my car. Now, a little bit of a preface here so that you know I'm coming from the right place, right? I think those of you've been listening to me for a while.

You know, I really don't delve into like money or material things. Not because I think they're bad, right? Or because I don't like them, money is great. makes life a lot easier, but more so because they're not really what lights me up, right? And in fact, I think they're a byproduct of the important things, right? It's like if you do the important things right, then the money usually follows. And so I like to spend my time talking about the quote unquote important things. But for the first time, I spent a little bit of money on my car.

I'd been investing everything back into the business for about 10, years now. And the convo with myself went like this, Eddie, you're in your mid-30s. When are you going to live a little bit? Right? It's like, what are you saving for? And so I did. And back to the moment, I'm standing there in that Walgreens parking lot, looking at the car, and something dawned on me. And I think this is where the magic is. Ten years ago, I was worried about rent. right? I had very little other than a laptop and an old dynamic microphone that I would take with me into bars, you know, when I was playing my set with my acoustic guitar. And it's like, think about what you flipped that mic into. Because that little mic was your starting point. And here's, you know, where I think the value is. You can.

You can take that little mic and see it as a piece of equipment, an amplifier of your voice, something used to record, a tool, right? Or you can see it as a portal to the universe, as something that can transform your reality as you currently know it. That mic was flipped into a recorded speech. recorded speeches were flipped into a YouTube channel and a brand. The YouTube channel evolved into speaking opportunities. The speaking opportunities evolved into creating a supporting staff,

placing incredible people around me. Those people, that team, has helped me create scale and reach hundreds of thousands of people every day and on and on and on. And from that continued evolution, right, that continued leveling up, comes the car that I'm staring at in that parking lot, a reminder of where I started. I can draw a direct line from that cheap dynamic mic that you'd have to hit against the table to get to work to turn on to that moment in the parking lot. Growth is seeing value where you are and trading up. It's looking around you and seeing not what is, but what all that can become.

See, I've used this metaphor before, but I think it applies perfectly here, right? Fantasy baseball, I'm going to nerd out on you. After college, my friends and I played for a few years to keep in touch. And believe it or not, I learned a ton from it. So in a nutshell, this is how you win. You see the value where you are. Value that hopefully your opponents do not see.

You find that value. You highlight it. And ultimately, you trade up. Every player is an opportunity. A little dynamic microphone. The question is, can you turn each one into your dream car? Right? So, quick example, player on your team is wildly overperforming, right? This person hit eight home runs in two weeks. But you know, you know, this guy isn't a home run guy. He has a nine-year track record of not really hitting home runs. So sure, there's a chance that he's suddenly improved. Possible. But more than likely, it's an outlier, right? So you seize the opportunity. You shop the guy to everyone around you while his values high. You try and trade him. See if you can get three players for him that are currently underperforming, right?

Squeeze the value from the moment. Take what surrounds you and trade up. And I won't go too far down the road on that example because I know how niche it is, but I want the concept to be clear. There's always an opportunity around you to identify value and transform it into the next stair of the staircase. It's always there. What you need is always around you. we just don't recognize it. We forget to look.

I heard Gary V. say years ago, or posed the question years ago, what is the ROI of a basketball? Gary said, well, for me, it's not very much, right? I'm a pretty short guy. I'm not a basketball player. What's the ROI or the value of a basketball to LeBron James? Literally billions of dollars. But what's the value or ROI of a piano to LeBron?

Not much. What is it to Alicia Keys? Again, a lot. And so in our own world, it's looking around and identifying what those things are and attacking them, capitalizing on them, right? The mic, the basketball, or the piano. Maybe in your world, it's Microsoft Word. It's a paintbrush.

It's the gym. Right? Could be an infinite number of things. But can you see it as not just minor detail in the great play of your life? But as your ticket to a reality, you dream of. Microsoft Word becomes where you tell your stories, which becomes your vehicle to connect with an audience, which becomes your incentive to write a book,

which brings you to a speaking tour on and on. Like, you get the idea. It's trading up from the little fragments of value that surround you. Because if you can recognize them and give them the respect they deserve, you'll see transformation happen. That little Mike and the courage to pick it up drove me home from Walgreens that day. It's the reason I'll be speaking in multiple countries over the next few weeks. It's the reason I get to share stories and pour into others with the hope that they do the same in their world. Look around you.

There is value. But the question remains the same, right? Are you willing to, one, identify it, and two, capitalize on it? Because a future you, walking out of Walgreens in a few years, will be grateful that you did. What if those less than ideal things in our lives? Right? So our limitations, our constraints, the aspects of life, we consider to be, you know, a bad hand.

What if they weren't just things we need to learn to accept or little tragedies we have to live with? What if they were ultimately the aspects of our lives that create the best of us? The elements of our world that push us to our greatness. And this came to mind earlier. I was listening to a book called How to Think Like a Roman Emperor by Donald Robertson.

And he explores this point. He talks about Socrates in ancient Athens and how he lived in abject poverty, how, according to the standards of ancient Athens, was not an attractive person by any means. It just seemed to have a lot working against him. And the question that's posed is whether these exact circumstances

ultimately created the man that became one of the most important thinkers in history. He implies that his reality and his surroundings shaped his worldview, so it only makes sense for one to conclude that all of it contributed to the life he lived. If Socrates was born wealthy and attractive and all these things, could he have become the man that he became? Probably not. And the reason I love this is because, to put it simply,

it reframes those less than ideal circumstances in our lives. Whether it is a personal trait we have no control over or an occurrence we deal with, it's understanding that a lack of ability in one area helps guide us to that spot where we can thrive. A disappointment we encounter helps us regroup and make our way to the thing that is ultimately best. the less than ideal, the things that at surface levels seem bad or problematic,

they're always working for us to push us towards our contentment and our growth to our greatness. I can say on my end, it was the turbulence I experienced in my life that created that sense of curiosity for me. It was a lack of understanding that pushed me to write about life, explore the hardships we face and the resilience of the human spirit through it all. It's a pretty famous stoic idea that states we can't often control what happens but we can always control how we respond to what happens.

And there lies the power and the understanding that when one door closes as the saying goes, you are pushed closer to the one that will open for you. You have to decide whether you will find it within yourself to open it. Or will you focus on the lack, the gap, what's not there, what you don't have, what went wrong? See all those things, the things that most people use as their reason to stop or quit or not go. They can be the reason you lose or they can be the very reason you win. You find a way. But that means moving forward.

forward trusting there is good to be had, understanding that everything that goes creates space for what truly needs to be there. I understand it's common, right? But it's not just a cliche that adversity creates us. The difficult times shape us. Why? Because we are transformed by the bad and the difficult and that which in the moment does not seem ideal. Because they've force us to move further into what we were meant to do and who we were meant to be. Just like Socrates was created from his adverse situation, his brilliance derived from his circumstance. Your greatness will be derived from yours. So remember that next time you feel as though you've been slighted by life or something's been taken away from you.

While it may feel negative and I get it from time to time it does, it ultimately becomes the wind at your back, bringing you where you most need to be. I'm going to start today's episode off with a quote. This is from Seneca, and he wrote, I judge you unfortunate because you've never lived through misfortune. You've passed through life without an opponent. No one can ever know what you're capable of, not even you. A brilliant member of the Your World Within Team, Ashley, she sent me a kind of a thought experiment the other day.

And she asked, if you're choosing between two trees, right, the exact same type of tree, height, everything, one-to-one, which one is stronger, right? And one of these trees exist in a very turbulent, you know, climate. High winds, a lot of fluctuation in weather, extreme temperatures, low temperatures, high temperatures, versus that same tree in a, let's just say, more mild, consistent, way less harsh climate. Which one do you think will be stronger?

And why? The answer is, well, Well, one, obviously acclimated and adjusted over time, it became tougher and stronger, more adaptable and resilient in the face of turbulence. It's proven itself because it exists where it exists. It had to evolve. Couldn't survive otherwise. Had to learn to endure.

It's by facing the storm that you learn to navigate its chaos, right? And, you know, having lived in South Florida, for a long time, you see some of these palm trees take a beating during, you know, cat threes, fours, God forbid, fives, and they're still there, right? The inverse or the opposite example is the tree that's never been tested because they've never had to be tested. See, every single one of us is stronger than we think and more capable than we know. The question in my eyes, you know, is how often do you know, is how often do you? you give yourself a chance to prove it? How often do you nod your head and kick open the door trusting that you can take on what's on the other side?

We have to be tested in order to evolve. Just like those of you familiar with weightlifting at the gym, building muscle is breaking down old muscle, and then it builds itself back up. A little bit fractionally, stronger than it was before you broke it down, right? Rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat. I think a lot of people don't realize that growth is just a lagging indicator, right? It's the product of your strength and your willingness to attack something new in the first place.

And sometimes, by the way, you know, life gives you no choice. It throws the kitchen sink at you. But, and this is the fun part, when you find... fall in love with that process, when the gratification of progress pulls you in, life becomes an opportunity, a gift, a game, a chance to step into an evolved version of yourself. We do what hurts now so that it doesn't hurt tomorrow, so that the doubt becomes armor. We attack things that seem bigger than us today so that, you know, those ceilings become floors tomorrow. Stop signs become stepping stones. And this is, you know, not merely a collection of cliches.

This is a very real reminder. You know, the further you're willing to go, the more life will give. The harder you're willing to push, the more opportunities are going to present themselves to you. Comfort isn't the enemy because of what it is. Right? Comfort is the enemy because of what it is not. It is not conducive to growth.

It's antithetical to any pursuit of meaning. Comfort is often stagnation. So how do we realize this? Simple. Go out into the world and as the saying goes, do one thing every day that scares you. You'll find what does scare you becomes more and more infrequent.

I'm not sure that it's the world getting smaller or as much as you and yourself believe and trust in who you are gets bigger. It's earning confidence. Oh, wow, the city can fall down and I can rise from the ashes. Then why not live a life with more skylines? Why not dive deeper into the horizon? Not to prove anything to the world, but to show yourself.

The chisel sharpens the mind. marble. It initiates the masterpiece. So when you look around and think I'm worthy of more, or my heart's longing for something different, bigger, a life transformed, drop yourself into the storm so that one, you become capable of moving through it, and two, you remind yourself, you prove to yourself who you are. That matters. You're not the type of person who sits and watches life go by, you are the person who steps into the abyss and determines what life is. You're not an order taker, you're an architect. Manufacturing opponents, not to defeat them, but to elevate you. So again, go find obstacles. Attack chaos,

immerse yourself in unknowns. Be the one who does. Be the one who does. doesn't know but steps in anyway, not to prove anything to the world, not to show anything to anyone, but to remind yourself that you can. To remind yourself that most will say no and that's fine, but that's not who you are. When the sky's falling and the walls are crashing, you are the one who finds a way. At night, the sky becomes visible. The darkness, the muting out of everything else allows the stars to finally shine through,

to make their presence known. And during the day, conversely, one cannot see those stars, but the world around him on the ground becomes illuminated. It's a push and pull that seems to work perfectly. And I think there's something poetic about the partnership existing between, the big picture goal and the small steps required to bring it to life. As one of my favorite sayings goes,

keeping your head in the clouds and your feet on the ground. Because here's what's interesting. If one were to only look up at the goal, she'd be consistently reminding herself of the ideal without taking the necessary steps to get there. And if one were to only look down at her feet, well, her steps would eventually become aimless. And it's that duality, right?

The need to both reassure yourself you can see the stars, as well as use the world around you to pull yourself closer to them that changes things. It's that beautiful dance that has to be maintained. And this is a balancing act that has certainly been challenging. Sometimes the pendulum swings way too far one way, sometimes way too far the other. But in a perfect world, you know, you wanted gravitating towards the center.

I remember just starting the YouTube channel almost a decade ago, having, you know, big multi-million subscriber goals, but completely lacking the systems and everyday practices in place that would walk me towards that finish line. I mean, sure, something's better than nothing. I was working and learning, but the actions simply didn't align with the objective.

I had to correct them. And then I've been on the other end as well. But I'd be doing things every day without knowing why. All steps, no goal. That sort of thing occurs when routine takes on a life of its own. You start doing things because, well, it's what I do. It's what I've always done. You know, this is when one has to look in the mirror and ask the difficult questions.

And look, anytime I can squeeze the complexities down into the simple, I try and do that. So with that in mind, my questioning goes like this. What do you want? No, the answer? Okay, good. Next question. Is what you're doing taking you closer every day to what you want? Asking that question in a serious way takes a spotlight to one's world. Using my previous metaphor, it shuts the lights off.

so the North Star becomes visible. And then, right, turns them back on to ask yourself if you're using your resources to move there. And I've become pretty good at asking myself this question consistently, and still I find things that don't belong. That sort of, you know, they hide in plain view. I have faith that I'll end up exactly where I need to be. But that faith is rooted.

in my commitment to continually assess, to scrutinize, and adjust. There's very little hope and a substantial amount of trust in my ability to continue forward. There's an idea referred to as the Stockdale paradox, which states, and this is the first definition I grabbed from Google here, you must never confuse faith that you'll prevail in the end, which you can never afford to lose, with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be. That's where the tough love thing comes in.

Be your biggest fan because no one will believe in you unless you do. It all starts with your trust in yourself to navigate the process and arrive where you must arrive. But it also requires you are your biggest critic. It means the reason you trust yourself to get there is because you know you won't just sit back and say, I'll win because I believe I'll win. No, you'll win because you will

while having your head in the clouds be brutally pragmatic with the steps you're taking on the ground. You'll win because you're committed to learning and adjusting. What of my favorite epiphanies when I started doing this full time was the realization at a very small, small scale at first, that, whoa, someone can't fail unless they quit. You can't lose unless you stop. Impossible, someone might think, right?

Well, no, because when you miss the mark or you fall short, you take a second to understand why, and then you come back to the problem or challenge again, right? This means life is a game of tenacity, of persistence, of commitment. The one who keeps adjusting and coming back is bound to connect the dots eventually, which makes failure the simple decision that, eh, this isn't worth it for me. I don't want to continue adjusting and re-engaging with this. And look, hey, depending on the situation, that may be the move, right? There have been things in my life where after sufficient trial and error, sufficient data,

I've said, this doesn't align with who I am or what I want. I'm going to walk away and pivot to something that does, right? But the key is knowing that it is a decision. To not reach a particular goal is a choice to no longer attack it relentlessly. And so when you feel lost or defeated or even frustrated with the process, try that line of questioning. What do I want? And is what I'm doing today bringing me there?

This allows you to start taking a sledgehammer to the things that don't belong, refining the process. And yeah, sometimes walking away from the things that are no longer in the scope of who you want to be and where you're going. But the power is in knowing, it's in understanding that your footsteps, the little actions of your day-to-day,

they are incredibly powerful. But most of all, when you are methodical with them, when they're pointed in the right direction, So pick your stars carefully and own those steps that take you towards them. Failure is not a sickness you catch. It doesn't fall on your head like a piano in those old cartoons. It's a choice. Meaning in positive terms, as long as you are committed to learn, re-approach, and repeat,

you will find yourself atop the mountain. As long as you're willing to evolve, you will ultimately arrive. 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 the 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 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 heart. 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, right? 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.

One of my favorite ideas, it states that 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, you 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. So much of life comes down to control, understanding what we cannot control while simultaneously capitalizing and making the most of the things that we can. A constant awareness that's critical to our evolution.

Epic Titus wrote, We must be at once cautious and courageous. courageous, courageous in what does not depend upon choice, and cautious in what does. And this idea has been shared many, many times in many ways over the centuries. Another of which a lot of folks have heard is the serenity prayer, right? God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can. and the wisdom to know the difference.

But regardless of how it's said and who it's said to, the point is the same. There are things we cannot control that we must find a way to stop exerting ourselves, stop exhausting our energy on. They are, as the saying goes, what they are. These obstacles are immovable. And rather than continue to push and push and push with all our strength and energy, our time is best suited, learning to effectively navigate them. And then there exists those things that are in our control. I believe it was the power of now by Eckart Tolle.

He said, and I'm paraphrasing, if something cannot be changed, stop thinking of it. about it, right? The future represents anxiety. It's worrying about things that haven't happened yet. The past is essentially depression. It's worrying about things that already happened. We can't do anything about the past or the future. All we have is now. And if it can be changed, then act now and bringing about a desired result. Take that first step. create some semblance of momentum, no matter how small. But to worry about what is behind you or in front of you is actually insanity. I remember loving the simplicity and pointedness of that message.

Accept it, eliminate it, or adjust yourself to it. Sometimes it helps when I think about things in metaphors, and I tend to do it often. This morning I was drinking coconut water. right, of all things. And I was thinking, man, it'd be nice. You know those little pieces of coconut that float around in there? It's like, it'd be great if they were not in there, right?

So I have this idea, just grab a strainer, pour it through the strainer into the glass. I'm leaning over the counter, watching the pieces of coconut collect in the strainer, and I'm just thinking sort of zoning out. Like, imagine if those were my problems, just being separated out of my life just like that, how nice it would be.

captured in a little net and then, you know, discarded, thrown away. But, you know, it didn't take me long to realize a couple things. One, such an idea would never happen. Life will always have some obstacle to place before us. That's what

life does. After all, the word is predicated upon the avoidance of death. It's a struggle and a necessary one. Which leads me to the realization number two, we want hardship. You know, purpose and meaning, they're derived from our willingness to overcome adversity and transform because of it.

A life without struggle is a car without wheels. And sure, you might avoid the fender benders, but you're not leaving the garage. So that's a thumbs down. So I thought, okay, well, what if I slightly adjust that thinking? What if it's a subset of problems that I can remove? That's when it kind of hit me, the opportunity at hand, right? Not the so-called problems, but my thoughts about them. There are the real difference maker here.

The negative storytelling that can be removed, pushed through the strainer. Again, not novel or groundbreaking. Like I said, a few minutes ago, this idea has been around for thousands of years, but sometimes things land perfectly. Right moment, right time. And I knew what I needed to do was remove the worries and concerns pertaining to the events that I could not change. Yet I exhaust my energy dancing around and around with my thoughts about them. You cannot change the future.

You can change right now, which ultimately becomes the future. And there's a difference. I had to, you know, pull that back in. See, I think most of our problems are derived from anger or emotional attachment to the immovable, the unchangeable. One of my favorite sayings is you can't change the direction of the wind, but you can always adjust your sails. And see, when you remove the self-tormenting you have going on about your past, things you wish you did or didn't do, when you remove the concern that the future won't be exactly what you want it to be, which tends to be where I lean of the two,

you're left with one thing. The present, right? Clarity. You have officially empowered yourself because the things you allocate your energy to can be changed, can be made better or adjusted. And that's really what it's all about. You can't change the fact

that someone you loved or cared about let you down. But when you dwell on, you're now giving up the present as well you're preventing yourself from doing what is required of you now to make your life better you can't control the fact that your company is reducing its size and your department is being eliminated can't control the fact that 8% get accepted to whatever you're applying to can't control the fact that you will be criticized for doing the unpopular thing the that you believe to be right. And I say these things not to be a downer. I actually don't think

there's anything sad about this. To the contrary. Now that you've accepted these truths, accepted this as reality, now you can move toward what's best for you. No more dwelling on the unchangeable. No more fighting unwinnable wars. No, it's time to go put yourself in position to conquer whatever mountain is next. By straining out the things that cannot be changed, you are left only with what can. You can't change your company's personnel reduction, but you can find something else, something better out there.

You can set the stage for a new journey. You can't increase the acceptance rate, but you can increase your value. Go above and beyond. Put yourself in position to succeed. And if you don't, they're lost. Continue learning, continue growing, continue moving forward. You can't stop the world's criticism. But you can learn to toughen up emotionally.

Learn to trust your intuition and decision making. Surround yourself with people you trust who lift you up. See, when you stop wasting time and energy on the wrong things, you get the right things. Like Greg McKeown says in essentialism, It's now but we can acquire. But often what we cut away, removing the things that weigh us down, that we're dragging along with us everywhere we go. They don't need to be there.

I say to myself often that I have everything I need. It's there. Some of it's materialized. Some of it exists as a seed that I need to identify in water and nurture, but it's all right here. Which means the problem will never be that I'm incapable. It will never be that I'm not good enough. No, when I'm in the wrong, it's because I've forgotten to see it.

I've either become consumed with the wrong things or lost faith in myself to do the right thing. And knowing this has been a gift. It's been tremendous. It's helped me even during the darkest moments to reacquire what matters most. Sometimes it takes hours, sometimes. days, even weeks, or longer, but I get there. Eventually I arrive and so can you. You have the ability to parse out why you feel the way you do.

To categorize the thoughts in your head. Can I change it? No, okay, gone. And with all that's left begins the journey, the good stuff, the adversity and the problems that will make you who you are. And don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying it will be easy. But I'm saying it will be worth it, and that's critical to understand.

Your world is there to maneuver and adjust to reshape. But its transformation depends on a laser-like focus on that which is malleable. That's saying, do what you can, where you are with what you have. It will lead you to exactly where you need to be. Even if you don't trust the road before you, trust yourself to walk down it. Nine things you do have control over that will make your life better. This is, I think, one of the most important conversations to have

simply because so much energy is placed on stuff that's beyond us, right, that we have no control over, yet we ignore the strength within us, the things that will actually transform our lives and push us forward. You know, stoicism obviously places a lot of emphasis on differentiating between these two things. Like letting go of what's not ours and, you know, really cultivating and strengthening what is. And there's plenty of iterations. One of my favorites and one of the most common, most well known is the serenity prayer. God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things that I can.

the wisdom to know the difference. It's that idea that you have within you a superpower, but you have to stop looking outside, right, and pointing at the sky for stuff that's just not yours, right? So let's dive right into it. That's where the power is, nine things you can control that will change your life. The first, and this is not going to be a surprise mindset. Why?

Because it doesn't matter if the sky's falling. or the walls are crashing down, how you think is yours. It's your strength. And no one said it better in my mind than Victor Frankel, where he says, everything can be taken from a man but one thing, the last of the human freedoms, the ability to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.

And when you understand the context, and this is a man who went through one of the grossest atrocities in human history, the concentration camps during World War II, and clung onto hope, right, left that situation saying, hey, no one can take your outlook from you. It doesn't matter how bad the world seems. That is one of the most empowering things I've ever heard. And when I look back at my life, and I'm sure a lot of you watching can relate, some of the darkest times ended up bringing me to the most beautiful places, you know,

And going through them in those moments, the ability to pause and just say, hey, I know this sucks. I know it doesn't feel good. But there's value here. Not intuitive. It's not an intuitive thing to do, which is why I think it's more important. No matter what you're going through, there's something there that's meaningful and even beautiful that will ultimately be transformative. Your attitude is yours. Nothing can take that away.

Number two, you always have control over how you allocate your time. There's an idea that what you water grows, which presents a simple formula. Understanding what's important in your life and asking yourself, are you giving that the sufficient attention it deserves? I think an easy example that we all relate to is, you know, people talking about financial freedom, wanting to be wealthy or wanting more money in the bank. Right? But when you have a conversation, well, okay, how much is coming in every day, how much is going out, what are your goals, what are you spending your money on? You know, all these somewhat basic questions, they don't know. It's like, well, you're not giving that the attention.

You're not aware. You're not monitoring or studying that. I guarantee you, if you took a spotlight to those things, it would evolve in a way that changes your relationship. with money and income in your bank account, right? So simple example, but you get the idea, where you focus is where you'll see results. So ask yourself, are you focusing on the right things? How can you be, you know, more methodical about your time?

Because again, that is always yours to control. Number three is the morning. And the morning is something I always have control over. We all do, and it's one of the most transformative periods of time because it's where you create your momentum. It carries into the rest of your day. When you go up and take care of yourself physically, for me, hopping in the cold plunge, sauna, coffee, journaling,

planning up the rest of the day, it 10x is the momentum and excitement and just the feeling I get as I navigate the day. And so for me, it's a no-brainer. W. Clement Stone, little hinges swing big doors. That, to me, is my little hinge. I can control that every single day. So it's something to think about.

How are you starting your day? Are you just rolling into the chaos? Or are you being methodical? And, you know, there's not a one-size-fits-all, you know. You are your own experiment. But are you playing with that and looking at different ways to launch into a day that is, you know, more productive, healthier, happier?

Number four is gratitude. Very simple, right? It's one of the most important perspective shifts you can make. Because if you never think about what you have, what's in your life, who's in your life, how far you've come, you fall into this place of lack, right? You only see the gap. And there's more to life than that, right? When you understand how lucky you are and, you know, how beautiful it is to be here and experience, this, it makes the bumps and bruises

along the way seem way less significant. So it's not just like a fluffy, hey, be grateful. There's a very pragmatic reason for it. Perspective. You know, life is innately hard. Okay. It arms you

with the ability to handle that adversity because you know you're grounded and you have an incredible situation and you're in position to tackle whatever comes at you. Number five is your willingness to listen. You can always control how much you listen. This one might seem silly at first or not important at first. So you realize very few people are good listeners and so much growth in understanding comes from listening, observing. It seems like we're

wired to want to talk and share and, as my grandfather used to say, flap our gums, right? But if you can find the discipline to take life in and learn from it and hear what other people have to say, you're arming yourself with knowledge that you otherwise wouldn't have had. Number six is a commitment to education, constantly seeking knowledge in some capacity. Now, it doesn't have to be in the context of a third grader in a classroom, but what areas of your life are growing, right? There's a very simple idea that progress equals happiness. we are more content beings

when we feel like we're in pursuit of something meaningful. Whatever that is in your life. So don't push that aside and think that you're done learning. You're never done learning. There's always growth. There's always some value you can take in that's bringing you closer to somewhere you want to be. Life is a teacher.

So don't forget to be a perpetual student. You can always control. That number seven, I know a lot of you will relate to this, your circle. You are the sum of what's the terminology, the five people you surround yourself with or the average of the five people you surround yourself with? Surround yourself with people who lift you up, who make you better, who are positive influences on your life, who push you to do more, who challenge you. Not folks that drain you and are negative and cripple your growth. You can always control who you're, around. And that, as it turns out, makes such a tremendous difference on your life outlook, how you look at yourself and how you look at the world. You can control your circle. Next, how you treat others. You can always control that. You know, are you compassionate? Are you empathetic? Again,

do you listen? Do you seek to understand? These things matter. And, you know, what goes around comes around. When you treat others well, not only do you feel better and pick up allies along the way, but that comes back to you. You know, so it's something to constantly think about and be cognizant of. How are you treating those around you? And lastly, you have control over the goals that you set. There's an idea that you cannot hit targets that aren't there.

Yet so many of us kind of stumble around through life, just hoping will end up somewhere that we're happy with. Most of the time, that's not how it works out. I heard Jim Rohn say this kind of tongue and cheek, and it stuck with me. He's like, there's never been a basketball team or a football team that took the court or the field that didn't have a game plan. And that's for, what, three hours? Yet some people live their entire lives without a plan.

When you think about it in that context, it just doesn't. make sense. So when you set those goals, when you're aware of the targets you've created, you're much more inclined to make everything in your life fit under that tent, to be more methodical and strategic and ultimately be where you want to be. That's what it's all about, right? You have that control. You just have to remember. So what goals are you setting? So there you have it. Nine things you can control that will change your life. I hope it gave you some much needed perspective and I look forward to seeing you all thrive and flourish and whatever it is you're doing. See you next week.