Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - IT’S NOT OVER, YOU'VE GOT WORK TO DO | Best Motivational Speeches | Wake Up Positive

Episode Date: July 26, 2023

“The road to success is dotted with many tempting parking spaces.” - Will Rogers

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And if we think about that just on a common sense basis, it's pretty apparent, right? People don't do things that stretch beyond their perceived identity. If I don't think I'm capable of accumulating wealth, for example, I'm simply not going to do the things or take the necessary steps required to accumulate wealth. Why would I? If I don't think I can help or add value to others, I'm not going to do things in an attempt to help or help. value to others.

Using that example, that stuff would exist on the other side of those walls I've placed around myself. That's why deciding what those targets are is so important. Deciding what's real matters. Because if you set the scope too small, if your reality is void of all possibility and imagination, even if you win, you've conceded too much. The premise you've been basing your entire existence and your decisions on is so limited that you can win there and still lose overall, still leave everything on the table.

And there's a ton of examples of this. You know, I commonly hear people refer to it with their work. I'm not crazy about what I'm doing, but how do I fix it? How do I learn to like this job? How do I exceed expectations in my role? How do I get a promotion so that I can bring in more income? All valid questions, certainly valuable questions, if it's where you should be.

And I can tell you, I remember asking those same questions to myself, and the conclusion I finally came to was, no, what you need exists on the other side of those walls. In this part of your life, it's critical that you move beyond those parameters. That's not what lights a fire in everyone, but it's what lit a fire in me. I was asking the wrong questions, right?

It was go over there and start your own business, start your own journey, start sharing the things you want to share. So what Alex Hermosso refers to is playing a different game altogether. And it's kind of a weird concept to grasp. You know, that you can win the game you're playing and still end up losing. You know, because you never thought to look for more. You never ventured to peer out over what was directly in front of you. This is a matter of self-reflection at its finest.

Because you'd never see those walls unless you really took the time to think about it, to be alone with yourself and ask those questions. It's the fun what-ifs. what if I stopped doing those things I don't like and started doing what I love? What if I didn't accept this as what I have to do and instead took a different path altogether? What if I was capable of playing a different game?

And what we find is that we're capable of some pretty incredible transformations. We're capable of taking what matters out of a less than ideal environment and recreating it somewhere that is ideal, that is conducive to our success in our growth and our evolution and our contentment. Instead of conceding so much and asking so few questions,

why accept those limitations? So again, I ask, where have you built your walls and why? And what if you push them back? like lines in the sand meant to be redrawn. See, perhaps the income coming in is a direct result of you feeling like, hey, that's just what I make. Perhaps your fitness level is the result of you thinking, that's just how I am. Perhaps your friends and the people you surround yourself with are a result of you saying,

it's just who I know. But there comes a point when new targets must be seen. set and new lines drawn. At least if any type of evolution's going to work. You don't have to perpetually navigate the revenue streams, fitness levels, and friend groups you have now. You can play a different game. Again, it's not always asking, how do I live within these walls?

Exist within these circumstances. Sometimes the question is, how do I say? Step into a new arena entirely. I've always been amazed at how much life can change with a small perspective shift. You hear something the right way, maybe even something you've heard a thousand times, this time you just hear it differently, and suddenly the light bulb goes off. Suddenly, it all makes sense. I was talking to one of my friends recently about how he threw discus in high school,

and he was incredible at the sport, but for a long stretch, he was inconsistent with his release. And coach after coach, after coach would try and help him with it, but it wasn't until one said to him, hey, instead of sprinting to the release, think of it as a scissor motion. Right now, I don't know much about discus, but for whatever reason, that clicked for him.

The gear started turning, he went to, States had the best performance of his life. All because he looked at the same situation through a different lens. He found clarity in what was around him. Now, you might be thinking, what does that have to do with me? Well, I'm of the thinking that in our own lives, right, the battles we are all individually fighting, the struggles we are going, through, you know, amidst that storm, we are one little light bulb moment from the clarity we need

to re-engage, to create momentum. We're never as far from what we need as we think, but what we do is we convoluted things. We tell ourselves that, you know, the change required is monumental. It's some larger than life transition. You look at my friend, the difference between a good season and an amazing season, it wasn't a year in the wait room away. No, it was a small mental shift. And even in your world, if the shift is just the beginning, great. Everything of substance does in fact have to start. And it's arriving at that point.

giving yourself the gift of clarity in a pursuit that becomes critical. I've always visualized that epiphany as me sitting in a dark room pitch black, which is intimidating, it's intense, feels even helpless at times, but understanding there is always a light switch and arms reach away. There's always the thing that will be transformative. We just have to keep reaching, keep stretching, keep feeling around for it because it exists. And with an outstretched arm, the very thing necessary to get us out of the dark and into the light is waiting. And that's just it.

You know, we can't conflate the goal with the delta between where we stand now and the goal. No one can run a marathon in one giant. step. It doesn't matter how strong you are. You're not leaping the course and diving through the finish tape. No, you're running thousands and thousands of little manageable steps. But we come face to face with situations in life where we know the finish line, whatever it is in your particular case, is way out there in the distance. And it's overwhelming. It's intimidating. It places us back in that dark room where we're surrounded by the unknown and inundated with stories we tell ourselves about how difficult life is, this is where you need to reach out and look for the light switch.

It's where you need to remember you're not responsible for the finish line because how could you be? Humans are only capable of moving forward one step at a time. It's where you have to understand that the greatest impact on the discus right now is a change to your release point, a perspective shift, something minimal, that gets you the distance. Every time I've been stuck or lost, it has been an adjustment to the way I'm looking at the world around me that's ultimately made the difference. A little reminder to take the pressure off. at least in the sense that we can only control what we can control.

And usually that's the step right in front of us. So my suggestion is to stop looking up at the mountain and look down at the very next step. Because from where you stand, there is a path to get you there. But the process calls for you to, one, believe it's possible, and two, make the little adjustment in real time that will put you in position to do just that. You're never down and out, not so long as there's air in your lungs and blood pumping through your veins.

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you know, looks like the place we're going tonight is a little fancy. And so for context, right, they're both from London. Their accents make this one million times better. And he hears her, he looks back over at her and says, well, we deserve fancy, don't we, darling? And I'm like, oh my God, you guys are a real life. movie and don't even know it. I thought it was just such a beautiful thing. Moments like that are everything. Reminders to immerse ourselves in the moment, in what matters with the people that

matter. This, of course, wasn't about the restaurant, but how evident it was that he was grateful to be there. I remember seeing a quote that said, if you can't find joy, in a cup of coffee, you certainly won't find it in a yacht. So how's that for perspective? You know, it's the little things that hold the value, the ones that become the big things. And while our eyes are fixated on mountaintops, life is about the climb.

Or as it's put in another anecdote, we live not for the destination, but for the journey. And see, this is a very timely topic for me. I woke up today having hit the milestone, 500,000 subscribers on YouTube, which has honestly been a goal of mine since I started doing this in 2014.

I woke up so excited, so happy, so grateful for every single view, for every person that stumbled upon my message and saw somewhere in my journey a little piece of their own. But as today's gone on, it's been interesting, I found myself more and more unsure how I feel. Because on one hand, it is representative of that exact thing.

The journey, the ride. I feel like the luckiest human alive with friends and family that have truly carried me through the valleys of life. And if anything, milestones like these honor them and the light they bring to the world. But on the other hand, a part of me couldn't help thinking, oh, okay, I guess one million. is next. And trust me, I wish that wasn't true, but it is. I remember reading in the

Almanac of Naval Ravacant, a passage where he said, essentially that the excitement of acquisition isn't in the thing we're acquiring, it's in the anticipation of it, the buildup. I believe you use the example of a Ferrari, implying that waiting for it was the fun. That's the rush. Getting it is just kind of, okay, now I have a Ferrari. And that's what makes these benchmarks we create so interesting. They're everything and nothing simultaneously. Reminders that finish lines aren't of value for their own sake. They're valuable because they remind you of the race you ran,

the highs you cherished, and the lows you fought through. Life ebbs and it flows. and I'm continuously fascinated by its duality, by the overlap we need to live in, how two things can be true at once and so often are. I can sit here today and tell you, I think in a lot of ways, societally we've gotten a little soft, too soft,

that we often fail to understand that the road to what we want runs through the very landscape that will push us to be more than we've ever been. that we have to get comfortable being uncomfortable, or that the beauty of being human is that we can make sacrifices now for that which we desire in the future. All this, as far as I'm concerned, is absolutely unequivocally true.

But there's also the existential question. Yeah, but for what? If you're not living, cherishing the little things, finding the miraculous in something as small as a cup of coffee, then when, when, darling, will you let yourself deserve fancy? Now, I'm not going to claim I have all the answers. I do not. But if my time on this planet is a test case, well, here's what had shown me. When life is all about the destination, the 500K milestones, the money. the growth, the status, the world becomes hollow,

and man does it hollow out fast? Things mean less. And while sure, they're often a valuable direction to point the compass, they are not life. And on the contrary, when it's all play in no direction, all wandering and no learning, all chaos and no building, that subsequent meaninglessness emerges again. It's in balancing the do.

Life is incredible, but only to those who make a point to see it as so. And God is that easy not to do. It blows my mind how easy it is to miss the things that are most important. That's what this day has taught me. The finish lines and 500,000 milestones, though few and far between, are a celebration. But they do not point to themselves. They point to the little things. They point to the people.

They point to the times you were walking through hell and kept walking. They point to the sunrises, sunsets, and times you sat back and thought, wow, am I lucky? After all, there's a reason the view from the top points right back down to the world below. Shines a spotlight on the very ascent you just didn't. endured, as if highlighting what really matters, what life is really about. And so today, by default, a new ship has left the port towards a new horizon. Compass aimed at, let's say, one million. Why not? But it's essential to remember that that is the North Star that guides the journey. It is not

everything. I challenge you to point your compass accordingly to whatever it is in your world that matters that excites you, that lifts you up. And when you arrive, let it be

not the goal in and of itself, but a celebration of the joy. The happiness contained along the way. The fact that you did look around and smile, did cherish those sunsets, sips of coffee, that you treated yourself to fancy, and that you paused every now and then to say to yourself, thank you.

One of my favorite anecdotes or mantras is work hard and silence, let success be your noise. That idea in my mind is perfection. your growth, your evolution, and yes, ultimately your accolades do this speaking for you. This always hit home for me for two reasons. One, because things of value come with a hefty price tag. We know this. Excellence requires sacrifice.

It is in many ways both a daunting and worthwhile pursuit. And two, well, because we often conflate flailing around with progress. In fact, some of my favorite books, whether it be Deep Work by Cal Newport, Relentless by Tim Grover, The Obstacle is the Way, by Ryan Holiday, part of what captivates me with these is the emphasis on what we are willing to do in silence, behind the scenes. That's where true meaning and value materializes. It's also where it's most difficult to commit and continue forward because in silence, there is no sense. audience clapping for you. There is no validation. When you're building and reading and improving, when you're at the gym or on those calls, establishing that foundation, putting in the hours, it's easy to look around and have doubts. And our brains go, I did the work, where's the reward? I sacrificed, so where's the payout? It's not in two.

to understand that, hey, it's not visible yet. One of my favorite metaphors, the lily pad pond, in which there is a pond with lily pads, doubling in size every day, and on day 30, the pond is completely covered with them. So what day was the pond half covered? And if we're thinking quickly, we might be inclined to say, well, half of 30 is 15, so it was half covered on day 15.

But that's wrong, because if it's not they're doubling every day, that pond wasn't half covered until day 29, and only a quarter covered on day 28. Meaning every day before then the change was so small that perhaps it wasn't even visible to the naked eye. So small that to onlookers, the prospect of it one day being covered might have seemed far-fetched. But what was at work was the necessary change to set the stage. To start what would ultimately become the exponential growth that

is noticeable, impactful. Now, of course, lilypads are not human, but little thought experiment. Let's say they had been. I'd like to believe that talking about their growth, their plans, right, them screaming about how great they are and what they will someday be would not

have helped them grow faster. In fact, it might have potentially even distracted the necessary evolution. The growth was not them versus the world, it was them versus them. And that's the idea, right? It's okay to work on you, to make a deal, sign a contract with yourself, that you are doing something now that only you understand, that won't be visible until a later day. Let success be your noise. Because there's often zero correlation between the loudest person and the one making the greatest impact. Let success be your noise because you can't

fake competency. Let success be your noise because leaders don't need to proclaim they lead and winners don't need to prove they've won and virtuous people don't advertise their virtue. It's in the doing. That's where we pay the price, the steep price. I've always said the last 10 years for me, hardest part wasn't failing. It was not when things didn't go as planned. The hardest part was simply not knowing. It was the whisper that, hey, all this could be for naught, that I'm wasting my time, that the whole idea is a car without wheels, and that's what hurt. But if I could go back in time, talk to my younger self, I would say, you know, all this, all of it, the ups, downs, highs, lows, it's making you who you need to be.

And if something doesn't work or go as you planned it originally, relax. You learn, you adjust, and you move forward. That's how the doubling of lily pads, right, using the same metaphor, occurs. You're learning, you're growing, and that's a you thing. I talked a few weeks ago now about the difference between a fee and a fine, as discussed in the psychology of money by Morgan Howe. The weight of not knowing it isn't a fine, it's not a penalty, it's the fee, it's the cost to get into the show, the ticket to something greater. But you have to walk through that door.

Again, it's a decision, it's personal, it's a commitment, it's nothing that screaming and seeking attention brings. You have to trust yourself, believe in yourself, right? Your effort is doubling in size. It's compounding exponentially, and you don't need to convince others. You need to say consistent and build yourself up until the world has to notice. Trust the mission you're on. As long as you're, one, moving forward, and two, learning and adjusting, you are destined for something greater. By committing, you have stacked the deck.

By believing in yourself, you have rigged the game. It's about hearing. and believing that voice that says, there's more in store for those who take it. And you are capable of that. That's the decision that will ultimately ring so loud it will echo through time. I was listening to Alan Watts the other day,

and he was referencing a Zen parable, and he asked this question I thought was pretty cool. He goes, when a flag is flapping in the wind, what's moving? The flag or the wind? The answer, neither. It's the mind that moves. It's how our minds interpret our experiences that create our realities.

And the reason this reminder is so important to me, the reason I don't believe we could ever hear it enough is because keeping that understanding front and center in our lives tells us how powerful we are. Sure, we often can't control the situation. We all know that. But we can always control what this situation means. Every event is open to interpretation.

And that's what's so incredible. Yeah, sometimes it takes a while to get to the value, especially when our minds want to default to the negative or what's missing or what's lost. But if you're willing to be able to, to look. Underneath every occurrence is exactly what you need. And so take for example something we can all relate to, losing something that truly mattered, that we found meaningful, whether it was a person, a job, an activity, a physical impairment, right? When asked, what does this change mean,

the mind goes loss. It defaults to, I had it, I loved it, and now it's gone. But underneath that there's a chance to take the pieces of what remains and go down a new path to find something just as or even more beautiful the same loss can mark the beginning of an adventure is it ideal at first no but it's usually not the ideal that prompts our most important change it's life's turbulence that pushes us to seek out something new And I love taking this little trip down memory lane, right? Because, you know, it's the business ventures that fell apart that caused me to look in the mirror and choose to be more. It's the projects that just didn't end up being that good, right, that allowed me to see this journey as a creative one.

Or, hey, some projects hit, some don't, but it's not personal. It's a ride, and what an opportunity. And it's the breakups I went through. And while sure, if you were definitely brutal, they gifted me with an opportunity to personally level up to dial in my understanding of what really matters to me. I can think of physical setbacks, monetary obstacles, all these things that hurt in the moment. Now I'm not sure I could have controlled the initial emotive response, right? The human reaction.

But learning to ask, well, how can I get better from the moment? this, that's a different question. How can one month from now be amazing because of this situation, regardless of how it feels in the moment? It's not the flag or the wind that moves, it's my mind. So how will I choose to paint the landscape around me? How will I choose to give meaning to the things that will ultimately comprise my reality? That's power. Now, I've always felt it easy to, to conflate like finding value in our lives with being happy all the time. But again, we're emotional creatures and life can be challenging for all of us. I don't think it's possible to be happy all the time.

That's not the goal. The true victory is in finding gratitude along the way, in pausing and asking, how can I take this seemingly unfavorable result and find a way to win from it? Because guess what? The sad truth is most people don't do that. Most people walk right by that stuff.

Most people chalk up the L's as L's and leave the good stuff behind. If you know there's a win in everything, and you ask that your mind look for it, the reality you create will be one much different than someone undergoing the exact same circumstances with their eyes closed. Remember, it's the mind that moves. It's you who writes the script. script who controls the narrative. And that's not a burden. That's a gift. It's what makes you more powerful than you could ever imagine. 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 nuanced 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 will. 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 those 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 must paint.

There's an old quote that states 80% of life is showing up. Now, showing up means many different things to many different people, but the idea is not complicated. You can't do anything of significance unless you have first and foremost arrived. Which brings me to today. See, I had a list of concepts I've been excited to talk about things that I've either read or have been recent epiphanies in my life. and I can't wait to share those with you. But this morning, oh, let me tell you about this morning.

Finding the energy to do anything, felt like trying to squeeze blood from a rock. I woke up with a headache, exhausted because I didn't sleep at all the night before. And you know that feeling. Like when you didn't sleep at all the night before, you're oddly constantly reminding yourself the next day that you didn't sleep. And everything just felt off. And really, as I'm speaking now, things still kind of do. And so I got up and I sort of played with the idea of taking the day off altogether.

Maybe I'm due for one anyway. I thought about resting. The little devil with the pitchfork on my shoulder continuously reminded me how great sleep would feel. And I was sitting there kind of weighing my options. Took some ipuprofen, started the coffee, sat down on the couch, just kind of looking at the wall, what to do, what to do. but realistically, I knew. And I want to explain why. Over the years, I've taught myself through repetition

that's sitting down and writing and recording, unless I plan intentionally to do otherwise, isn't non-negotiable. It's helped me see that the goal, in any meaningful pursuit, should be getting to the point where, despite the circumstances, You show up.

Stephen Presfield, whose voice often echoes in my mind when I come face to face with these situations. He wrote, art is war. Between ourselves and the forces of self-sabotage that would stop us from doing our work. The artist is a warrior. Artist, being anyone bringing something to the world that does not yet exist. And he goes on to describe the battle. with the mind over sitting down in that chair and writing when we know we must write but don't want to. When a tired or distracted mind begins looking for off-ramps, as mine clearly

started doing this morning. These seemingly trivial moments, when any rational soul could argue for the validity of postponing their date with Microsoft Word, will they come to matter more than ever, because greatness is a byproduct of intentionality. If you become accustomed to breaking promises to yourself, if you leave that door cracked for exceptions here and there, it will ultimately be kicked open. And that's why I inject little reminders like that into my life, to keep that mental muscle working. For example, there can never be dishes left in my sink when I go to Why? Because if I skip it once, there will always exist reasons to skip again. It's a very easy thing to not care about.

Because here is the reality. Progress is a lifestyle. Growth is a lifestyle. At least if we're talking about any meaningful type of evolution. I just finished reading, It Takes What It Takes, by Trevor Moad. One of those three to five hour listens on August. depending on how fast it's playing, it really packs a punch. And I'm going to be diving into a few of his concepts a little more in the coming weeks.

But one thing he discusses that I found incredibly valuable is the illusion of choice. And what the illusion of choice highlights is that there are a set of behaviors that must be carried out to be effective. The idea of alternate roots is an illusion. There are no choices when it comes to what's necessary. We know what must be done to win. Now, knowing that is one thing. Knowing that and having to propel yourself to action when you feel like garbage is something different entirely.

But that's why it's so valuable to get to that place where you can take the emotion out, remove the internal deliberation, and automate the things you know are going to have. help push you to be that better version of yourself. In other words, you show up for you, period, and that is a non-negotiable. The level we all need to get to. And I'm thinking about this drawing parallels to a lot of different aspects of my day, right?

The interval training I have this afternoon. When you're exhausted, 40 minutes in and are switching from squats to mountain climbers or whatever it is, right? the instructor makes the announcement, I don't think about anything. I don't give myself a chance to try and rationalize any weakness. I know, if this is important to me, keep that door shut. No thinking, just doing next. Simply doing what you always do, what you've signed up for, cannot be self-perceived as some monumental sacrifice.

No, it's just what you do. It's neutral. Sometimes you feel like it. Sometimes you don't. But you do what you do. And that puts you on track to accomplish some incredible things. And so remembering this, ultimately pushed me through that studio door this morning

and placed me down right in front of my mic. Sure, I had to adjust some things. Definitely picked some mellower music. There's going to be no crescendoes today, or my head will explode. But this is not torture. In fact, I'm really happy. with the way the episode's turning out.

I would have missed out on something that I think is going to be pretty valuable in a variety of ways. But what I'm telling myself is that this is not a victory. It's certainly not defeat. It's just what I do. And so the question worth asking yourself when facing the adversity life presents in whatever arena you were in

is are you willing to show up for you? Can you turn that internal deliberation switch off when it comes to the necessities before you? Minimize that rationalizing that I battled with this morning. We don't need or want that. There should be no thinking, no crack doors, no metaphorical dishes in the sink. If you decide something is important and you sign that dotted line when it's time to execute, you act. and then you move directly onto the next. The goal is to not even negotiate with weakness.

Now that's not to say Pressfield's aforementioned War of Art won't rage on as you journey to the new horizons you've set out for. But just like anything, it's an understanding that will help you focus. It will help you say no to the distractions and the distractions and the minutia and continue writing your story, constructing your reality line by line

and piece by piece. You can allow yourself to be distracted or, as Robin Sharma suggests, you can do incredible things, but you can't do both. You can stay where the safety and security is. Or you can risk what you have in pursuit of your dreams, but you can't do both. You can remain the character depicted in yesterday's story,

or you can take those lessons, experiences, and craft a new story. But you cannot do both. Life is a game of trade-offs, where any decision to go in one direction is a simultaneous simultaneous decision to not go in another. A commitment to X is necessarily a rejection of Y, at least in that moment. Making this question all the more important, what is your North Star? I ask, because everything you do is bringing you closer to or holding you back from capturing it.

One of my lifelines over the years has been clinging to the quote or idea. that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, consistently trying to arrive there. Why? Because when things get complex in my life, I don't know what I'm choosing. Clutter means I've lost sight of what's necessary versus what's trivial. I become unclear on those critical trade-offs I'm making.

And we've all experienced this, right? The simplest questions are always the hardest to arrive at. We can talk in circles about the details, but how often are we honest with ourselves about the why? I remember job interviews in college going on and on about the books I read, the papers that written, current events, but then falling flat on my face when asked, so who's Eddie Panero? A dude doing an interview?

Like, what do you want for me? My brain had never gone there. Or even less formal. I'll never forget a friend of mine a few years back, asked me what my perfect day was, just casually as we're driving. I said, I don't know, Tom, I've never really thought about that. He goes, then how are you ever supposed to have a perfect day if you don't know? And how simple? Simple and simultaneously incredible. Who wants a life without perfect days, right? Like, what is all this for? The world is infinite. And you can be ruled by its variability and

its complexity. You can run around adhering to all its rules, hoping you're doing the right thing, whatever that is. Or you can identify, carve out, and rule over your own little piece of it, your own kingdom. You can choose you. If you take the time to uncover who you are, what lights you up. And then, as Emerson advocates, hits your wagon to that star. The best investment, of our time is to truly understand and decide what we should be saying yes to. Because if we don't know what matters, then nothing does. Here's a famous dialogue from Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. Alice, would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?

That depends a good deal on where you want to get to, said the cat. Well, I don't much care where, said Alice. Then it doesn't matter which way you go. said the cat. Well, so long as I get somewhere, Alice added as an explanation. Oh, you're sure to do that, said the cat. If only you walk long enough. Beautiful passage.

If you don't care where you go, any road will take you there. And see, it's not wrong to not know. It doesn't make you bad or mean life is a waste of time. It just means you're taking a large portion of control, which is one of your superpowers and tossing it up into the ether. It means you are bowing to hope. And I know that no one here wants to live every day merely clinging to hope. This is not a we'll see how it goes, channel or podcast, right?

This is about the little changes that take life from a six out of ten to a nine or a ten out of 10. It's about using what's around us to maximize the miracle we are living and breathing every day. Again, life is complex. So for you to take the time and simplify to remove what's unnecessary, what an advantage. Yeah, I could do this or that. I could go here or there. But guess what? I've spent the time thinking, asking myself the tough questions, and now I can be more deliberate in choosing my path so that I arrive at a correct destination, a destination that belongs to me, that means something to me, that lights me up and excites me.

That's living. And of course, this isn't a one-time lightbulb moment, a permanent move. No, as we grow, we change. What we want shifts. Hey, sometimes the current path even reveals itself to be the wrong path. It's happened to me plenty. but when you're consistently in tune with what matters to you, who you are, you can make the adjustment.

You can be deliberate. No more shooting targets in the dark because life is too short. Our days numbered are arrows finite. Live life like each day means something. Because each day is transporting you to your. something. Let's use the pieces around us to build our own skylines, etch our own stories into the sands of time. If a decision to do one thing is a simultaneous decision to not do something else, make sure to have that North Star in scope so that you don't amidst that chaos of life,

unknowingly turn your back on it. Ask yourself who you are. And be as patient as possible working for that answer. Because as far as I can tell that information is the key that unlocks infinite possibility. It's knowledge that opens the door to life on your terms. Lead yourself first. Before we can influence, before we can ever persuade or change anything externally, we have to first lead ourselves. And that means delivering on the promises we make to ourselves. It means showing up when we tell ourselves we're going to show up. It means putting ourselves in an environment conducive to growth. There's an old metaphor from Wayne Dyer about an orange where he essentially says that it doesn't matter what you do to an orange. It doesn't

matter how hard you squeeze it, or how many you have, or how you manipulate it, grapefruit juice will never come out of an orange. Only orange juice can be emitted, and similarly, we can never give or contribute what we do not have inside ourselves. We can't expect our lives to look like anything other than a culmination of the tiny action, steps and decisions we make on a daily basis. The external world is a product of the internal world. And the internal world is not realized until we learn to rule over ourselves and our lives

with conviction. You can break this down in many different ways. Chaco Willink says discipline equals freedom. John Maxwell talks about a leadership lid where success levels can never exceed leadership leadership capability and sure it applies to teams but it also applies to self-leadership. Are you searching for and committing to the little hinges in your life that as W. Clement Stone says swing big doors that make the difference? Are you taking responsibility for your shortcomings like leaders do? Are you learning to trust yourself?

Are you seeing past the trap of perfection and committing to progress? Are you taking the little things seriously. Because at the end of the day all things are comprised of little things and only little things. The bottom line is that we master nothing until we master ourselves. Trust ourselves. The bottom line is that we win when we lead ourselves to hold ourselves accountable for the little things that matter even when it hurts or retired. Even though no one's going to come up and reprimand us for falling short. There are often no visible consequences when we let ourselves down, so let's manufacture that urgency. If you promised yourself you'd get up when that alarm clock goes off, it

becomes no longer optional. If you promised yourself, you'd go down the road that scares you, it becomes no longer one road of many, it is now the only road. Even though it may be scary or intimidating, it's the darkness that must be confronted. You are more powerful than you know, you are more capable than you understand, but you must lead yourself to your potential. Those little things matter. And so while the temptation is to brush them off as insignificant, While the rest of the world ebbs and flows through life like jellyfish with the tide, your superpower will be to see, harness, and multiply those little decisions like they are gold. Your strength is that when it's easier to run, you'll be the one that instead stands up and leads yourself to greatness.