Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - LIVE FEARLESSLY - Best Inspirational Speeches For Greatness

Episode Date: October 7, 2024

"Good is the enemy of great." – Jim Collins What if the real enemy in life isn't failure or obstacles, but the "good" things that hold us back from greatness? In this episode, Eddie Pinero explores how contentment is often derailed not by adversity, but by settling for what’s comfortable and "good" instead of pursuing the extraordinary. Life gives us what we ask for, and if you want to live fully, you can't settle for less than greatness. Join Eddie as he dives into the power of choosing excellence over mediocrity and embracing a life of true fulfillment. Monday Motivation Newsletter: https://www.eddiepinero.com/newsletter Free Ebook: www.eddiepinero.com/ebook  YouTube: www.eddiepinero.com/youtube 

What if the real enemy isn't who or what you think it is? What if it's not the things that are, quote unquote, bad? What if it's not misfortune or disaster? Obstacles, you know, getting in the way of what you think you want most? What if it's none of that? What if the real enemy is good? What? You might be thinking, good? Well, let's dive into the context.

Because in a nuanced world where so much lives in the gray space, the details mean a lot. See, I'm a reflective guy. I enjoy thinking about these things, and I think that a happy life. Not even a quote-unquote successful one. I'm not talking about finances or followers or sales or any of that stuff. I'm talking about overall content. feeling good. When I look back on my life, contentment was more often derailed by good than anything else.

See, those blatantly unaligned things, the sharp pain, the oh hell knows, they're easy to avoid. They shine so bright that we can't help but turn away. The good things, though, they are the wolves and sheep's clothing. They hide. It's hard to say no to good things.

After all, they're not pain-inducing. No, certainly not, at least in the moment. They are, however, a decision, a decision to take the good train instead of waiting for the great, the excellent, the incredible trains to arrive at the station. Good is saying, yeah, I don't see anything terribly wrong with this. And from a distance, it checks out. And see, with that philosophy, what you're left with under these circumstances is a good life.

Time spent doing good things, surrounded by good people, making good progress. And hey, maybe good is enough for you. I'm not here to tell you what happiness should look like in your world. But I am here to say that life will give you what you ask of it. And if peak living is on the agenda, good simply cannot be. at least not consistently, at least not at scale. I'm asking that you imagine a world where you spend your time doing things that you deem to be great

that tap into your heart, your soul, your curiosity. They don't merely check a box. Their value isn't the no-news-news-good-news mantra. Their value is that they create a pathway to your soul and invite you to step into a beautiful, currently, un-evolved, version of yourself? What if you surrounded yourself with great people?

Not people who were nice enough. Not people whose value is a mere lack of confrontation or constant tension. Now that should be a baseline. What if you surrounded yourself with people who lifted you up? Who made you better? Who reminded you of life's finitude? Your short window to make an impact

in your ability right now to do just that. Imagine what that would feel like. And if merely hearing these things seems preposterous and far-fetched, that means this message has safely arrived to your doorstep in the land of good you currently occupy. I've heard people say for years, give up good and go for the great.

I would hear that, I'd say absolutely, I'd clap like a baby seal, nod my head like a golden retriever watching TV, then I'd step out into the real world and see how very hard that is to do. Why? Because good is comfortable. And most importantly, good is not bad. The brain can be very easily tricked into thinking that's enough.

How terrifying the prospect of giving up no news in exchange for bad news. Shivers run down my spine. But, and you knew this question was coming, will you give up no news for great news? What if there was a little boat tied to your harbor? And that boat symbolized avoiding failure, mitigating risk. It's living not for greatness, but to avoid mistakes. I think there are a few things that would be more freeing than walking up to that little boat,

cutting the bowline and letting it float away into the distance. Why? Because the life of chasing down opportunity, of living for the upside, well, it ignites the flame in you that's been waiting to burn, those parts of you, the ones you've been dying to explore, and some you're probably not even aware of yet, they are ready to be set ablaze.

Now, is this something always front and center on my mind? Is it something I always remember? Of course not. Which is what makes this point all the more important. I speak on this because every time I'm brought back to that point, my life is better. I need the reminder, the thought experiment. The blatant misalignment in my life is easy for me to spot.

But the good? the good is sneaky. In fact, if it weren't for a friend of mine, a great friend of mine recently reminding me that it's hard to step away from the good. But good is not what my soul wants. It probably would have taken me longer to look around. That good boat would still be bobbing on the water's surface

in the harbor that is my mind. And I'm not naive. I understand that comfort is. good, the lack of noise, the ease at first glance, sure, it works. But I've come too far to find comfort in the eye of the storm. I owe it to myself to fight through its walls, its winds, its turbulence, and find the skies that bring me contentment outside the storm's center. And I'm guessing that if you're listening, we're not all that different.

And so if you're asking what's next, what must change, what must go, I hope you'll find the courage to free yourself of not only that which is detrimental, but that which is good. I hope you'll find it within you to make space for the greatness in you that will light up your world. So life is the sum of the decisions we make. But which decisions? How am I supposed to know? Well, maybe a list will help. Some pros and some cons list one. Finding the courage to do something new, okay?

Cons, it could be a waste of time. Could embarrass myself. Could lose money. Could get criticized. Pros could be life-changing. Finding the courage to go somewhere new. Okay, cons might not like where I go. Might not know how to get there. Might regret going. Pros could end up being the best decision I've ever made.

Finding the courage to change myself, okay, cons. Might not like who I become. Might try, fail, and feel worse than I did to begin with as possible. Pros, well, I might become exactly who I need to be. So looking at this, it essentially comes down to conserving the old or making the new. maintaining or capturing the upside. But it doesn't quite delineate my problem. Okay, so different angle list two.

Finding the courage to do something new. If I fail, is it reversible? Yes. I can fail. And if I do, I'll simply go back to doing that which I had been doing. All right, finding the courage to go somewhere new. If I don't like the destination, is it reversible? Yes, I can change my flights, grab a train, turn the car around, I decide where I go

Finding the courage to change myself if I don't like the trajectory is it reversible? Yes, if I don't like how I'm evolving I can stop I can start back at the beginning who you are is in your control. Okay, so after two lists The pros have immense upside and the cons Well, they have relatively minor downside, and they are reversible. Meaning, if I try something I've always wanted to try, go somewhere, I've always wanted to go, become the person I've always wanted to be, things could fall apart. But the damage is more annoying than it is life-altering. It's not forever, it's fixable.

On the other side, if I hit that home run, my life changes. My world evolves. What's possible expands. And it's not that I will, it's that I could. And doesn't everything start with could? A seed of possibility? An idea that plants roots and when merged with courage in action take shape? Of course.

But most importantly, this information in front of me tells me something pretty incredible. A story with few words and infinite meaning. The key that unlocks some of the most important doors to be opened. And it's this. Most of our inaction, most of our regret, most of our almost come from cowering amidst possible outcomes that are reversible, running from potential consequences that we could wipe clean like a dry eraseboard and try again. The downside, it pales in comparison to the upside. We're really running from a slap on the wrist

or the momentary anxiety associated with turning down the wrong street. Right, that's the takeaway here. That's where the magic lies, not in the possibility that everything could work out, but the realization that if it doesn't, life moves right along. That contrary to the narrative,

so often making its home in the back of our minds, life has redos. You can screw up, you can reverse track start again, the only action you can't fix is the one you never take. And while I'm looking at this list and I just don't see any upside in that. Sometimes it's what we don't say that echoes the loudest. What we don't do that has the greatest consequences, where we don't go, that ultimately gets us lost. I remember as a teenager applying to college. I was working on the admissions essay.

I was brainstorming with my grandmother, talking over possible topics and approaches. And she read me this quote that's sometimes attributed to Mark Twain, but that's beside the point. The quote states, 20 years from now, you'll be more disappointed by the things you didn't do

than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bow. lines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails, explore, dream, discover. I thought this was the perfect bridge to the next chapter in my life. The latest horizon, the newest adventure. I thought it was incredible and it was. It was exactly what I needed and so on to that next adventure I went. And here's the thing. As life unfolded this equation, somehow transformed from exploration and dreaming and discovery, into the question, well, what am I supposed to do?

Somehow without my paying attention, life turned into a checklist. A question I couldn't get wrong. A test I needed to make sure I didn't fail. It's amazing how quickly we forget the infinite. breadth of life because we're focusing on the dotted line before us, the one we're supposed to walk. Sometimes we're so fixated on what the expectation is that we don't ask ourselves where these expectations are coming from. Who is so significant and wise that they know what's best for you to a greater extent than you do? See how that's an important question.

And also one you can lose in your periphery as you follow that dotted line before you. When you have a destination in mind, hopes, dreams, ambitions, well, that's an adventure. When someone else has a destination in mind for you, whether this authority is imaginary or not, that's obedience. And sometimes the greatest disservice we can do to ourselves is to not stop it. to not stop and ask ourselves where we're going and why. Do you remember when you were a child and you got into trouble, right? Sometimes you'd get sent to your room. And for me, this was agony.

When it was punishment, I wanted to be anywhere but confined within those walls. I hated being sent to my room. And then finally, the door would open. My parents would say, Eddie, you can come out now. I'd go outside, play basketball for a little bit, and then oftentimes I'd find myself right back in my room. Happy, you know, playing with my toys, whatever I was doing, not a care in the world, and it's like, what changed? Nothing but the context. Same me, same room, same toys, same whatever I was doing.

It was, however, no longer a punishment, and I think this realization is worth exploring. We may not realize, we may not even be able to articulate it, but I think we long for control over our lives. We long to walk our own path. And in this situation, the path led me right back to where I was. Sometimes, though, the path leads us in the opposite direction, far away to distant world. The end destination is not as important as the fact that we chose. it, that we asked ourselves why and that we believe in the answer and immerse ourselves in its execution.

So when Mark Twain talks about the things that we don't do holding more weight in our hearts, it's because those things we tend to skip over are often the very things that breathe life into our souls. We'll go to school to get good grades, to get a 9 to 5, to get a promotion, to get a more mortgage on a home. But the audacity to open that photography studio. The nerve to think you could rent a van and travel the country. The delusion to think you could start that routine that will get you in the physical shape you've always dreamed of.

See, we're lucky and fortunate to have the things that we have. The quality of life we lead now far exceeds those that came before us. Life is convenient, incredibly convenient. incredibly convenient. But what is convenient if it comes at the expense of purpose, of meaning in life because that's what steers the ship? A crisis of meaning ultimately mitigates everything else. There is no exploration without meaning. And without exploration tomorrow becomes a repetition of today. Not an evolution. And what's incredible, truly, truly incredible is that our purpose can be rediscovered, our paths redefined.

How by having a long conversation with, you guessed it, yourself? By putting the phone in another room, by disconnecting the Wi-Fi and spending time with you, something along the lines of dear self. What matters to me in this world? Where am I going right now? Is where I'm going right now aligned with what matters to me? in this world and sometimes the answer is yes sometimes no great but what we have now is a foundation to work off of an awareness that should be celebrated that you created it's so easy to walk through life

and never have that conversation it's so easy to sleepwalk to the tune of someone else's song the beat of other people's drums but when you open your eyes You see the correlation between your thoughts and your actions, your actions and your reality. You realize that when you wake up that tendency to ask yourself what you have to do today, to reflect on your problems, those questions you assumed were normal,

that you never gave much thought to, well, now you'll see you can dismantle that notion. Now you'll see that if you can ask yourself what you have to do, You can just as easily ask yourself what you want to do, what you get to do, what life is inviting you to do. If you can reflect on your problems, you are just as capable of reflecting on the opportunity at your fingertips. If you can spend time dwelling on whether you're walking the obligatory dotted line that's been laid out in front of you, you're just as capable of redrawing that line and allowing it to pull you, into a new dimension.

Listen again, 20 years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bow lines. Sail away from the safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails, explore, dream, discover. Explore, but for you,

wander down those paths that have for so long piqued your curiosity. Try things you once felt like other people were entitled to, but you'd never given yourself permission. Be that for yourself, because no one will come up to you and randomly give you that green light. Dream, because without building your castles in the air, as Thoreau calls them, you live your entire life on the ground. You'll never hit targets that you don't create. And sure, there'll be a time that only will be a time that only, you'll live your entire life on the ground. time that only you see the destination. Great, that's life, but with each step forward as it becomes

more real for you, it will make sense to others as well. Trust each step like it is in and of itself a miracle. And you'll find in time that that's exactly what each step was. And lastly, discover. Discover who you are, what you're capable of becoming. As Emerson said, to be your in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment. To forge your own path, build your own life, stay true to your own heart is courage. So sail away because you have the ability, because you are strong enough, and because the story you're about to write doesn't continue on. until you turn the page on today's chapter.

Life is the manifestation of stories. Stories we tell ourselves about the world and our place within it. Rules that we've constructed and we respect, we adhere to. They dictate the outcomes we get. They become our reality. Because to establish a parameter means at some point there's a line that we don't cross, right?

And there are obvious. lines that we point to and we say no thanks. For example, our values, right? I won't do X because well, it will hurt someone I love. Or legal parameters. I won't do Y because I know the repercussions they're too much. It's not in my self-interest. And these are obvious. These are talked about. We're aware of these stopping points. But I want to talk about a different set of rules. The stories we're writing without realizing we're doing it. How we think we're running a sprint, but I have no idea that there's heavy weight on our shoulders holding us down, and you can't take that weight off if you don't know it's there. And this all came to me a few months ago. I was in L.A. for the weekend, having lunch with some incredible entrepreneurs. They've done some amazing things.

And one of them sold a dating app for hundreds of millions of dollars. Another one a health care company. Another one had a very successful food distributing business. and I'm sitting there kind of blown away. And my priority was to listen, not run my mouth or fabricate or impress, but to simply observe what creates this type of result. I was listening to Alex Mayer, who created Zeus, talk about his upbringing. He came to the U.S. as an immigrant from Iran

and worked his way up from nothing. It's not like these folks were given the world. They took it. And it took me about three minutes to find a comment. commonality in their worldview. To me, it couldn't be more evident. It was impossible to miss. They don't look at life how I do, or at least how I did. See, the story I told revolved around my parameters. Sure, I had moments of boldness. I pushed myself. I worked hard, but I looked at life in terms of what it would allow. Here's how things are. Okay, how can I stretch that,

But that's like repainting or adding on to a house that was already built, right? There's only so much flexibility, so much you can do with that. But these guys are going around the table talking like little kids on Christmas, right? Talking about life like it's a game. Talking about opportunity like it's an apple waiting to be picked from a tree right outside. There was no, what will the world allow? It was with a smile, anticipation, and self-believe, what can I make? And Alex, who I mentioned earlier, sold Zeus, created Menserbox, and he loves beef, eats it all the time, right?

And so it's become his next entrepreneurial venture, a healthy beef stick company. And every thought seems to revolve around that. How can he take something he loves and share it with the world? His imagination is now driving his thought process, which drives his action. Not parameters, not someone else's reality, but possibility. See, I left the table with this feeling I've never really had before. It's like someone tapped me on the shoulder and reminded me of the freedom contained in every single step. Not flexibility, but freedom.

Like a weight had been lifted off of my shoulders. Who cares if you mess up? Who cares if you lose? Who cares? That's part of this game we're playing. A game where reality isn't an obligation to be lived, it's an opportunity to be explored. It's not about what you do. It's not about what you don't have.

It's being grateful for everything that brought you to right now. Because right now is a perpetual launching pad. You know, growth is learning. And that afternoon, I learned to take life way less seriously. To enjoy it. To let imagination drive every step. Because the difference is some of us build because we don't want to lose. We don't want to succumb to fear and not mean.

meeting our potential, right? We fear being inadequate, falling short, we see obstacles. Some of us, we build to capture the beauty, the excitement. That makes the difference. And look, I'm not presenting you empirical data. I don't have all the answers, but I'm willing to bet that years from now, looking back, that simple understanding will have played a substantial role in whatever comes next. The rules changed, and so did the path.

Let's not become so focused on each footstep that we lose sight of where they're collectively taking us. What are you building? Why are you here? To play by someone else's rules or to transform yourself and by default the world around you? See, reality is fluid. It's malleable.

And the beauty is in that process of creating a ship leaving the harbor, has infinite possibility, unlimited potential, and that gives it its power. There's no right turn or wrong turn. The only way to lose is to stand still, to think that horizon in the distance is too far or not for you. See, a harbor is not a stopping point, it's a beginning. So take control over that world, push it, test it, see what it has to offer, throw your interest and your curiosities against the wall, see what sticks. See what ignites your soul.

Test the universe because life it rewards the bold. Those courageous enough to step outside their front door and not follow but design. Those who know things are the way they are simply because others before them had the courage to make it. So, well now it's your turn. You defeated the one in 400 trillion odds stacked against your birth. You navigated through your low points. You've done enough to get to this very moment, this instant. For the mistakes that brought you here will become the wisdom that leads you forward.

That takes you to places you never thought possible. been where exactly that is is entirely up. Like I said upstairs, it's been an amazing trip. So last day and gonna make it count.