Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - MORNING ENCOURAGEMENT | 1 Hour To Start Your Day Right | Motivational Speeches

Episode Date: September 23, 2022

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. --Steve Jobs

On that long drive, in the middle of the night with headlights and endless road in front of me. Everything I knew in the rearview mirror, I learned the value of making the difficult decision. During the times of disappointment, being let down by the ones I counted on I believed in, I learned the importance of loyalty, the power of being there. for those who mean the most to you. Through the failures, the stress, the uncertainty, I learned that life goes on. That when you allow yourself to fall,

you build an immunity to the fear associated with hitting the ground. You get back up stronger. Through the heartbreak, the loss, the pain. I learn to appreciate every moment. To look around and not take any of this for granted, to both recognize and appreciate the fragility of the present, because with the snap of a finger, life can change. In the wake of past anger and conflict, I learned to pick my battles. That rarely is it worth my time. That our vantage points are

merely a reflection of our backgrounds and understandings, and even the slightest effort, To understand the person staring back at you can be the difference between building up and tearing down. From being overlooked, disregarded, the smallest person in the room, I learned the value of true leadership, the benefit of empowering those around you and making them feel appreciated. That walking alone may sometimes be necessary, but that building a vision

that those around you believe in is unparalleled. Life is a teacher, and only through its toughest tests can its curriculum be understood. Can its ideas and lessons take shape? What you need exists, so long as you open your eyes, and you'll find an inevitable truth, that this universe, it wants you to win. It's holding its hand out, providing you everything you need.

Just understand. Understand that the lows prepare you for the highs. The losses set up the gains. The mistakes build a foundation for the greatest things you will ever do. Life is a teacher. And should you listen, you'll see that it has no bounds, no restrictions, just the next chapter. In order to become something new, you have to leave something behind.

You have to detach in some capacity, remove yourself from the physical realm, because the obstacles that we face are not physical. 99% of our problems are not physical. They're mental. And as you sort of drive that metaphorical ship into the horizon, the biggest turn is never going to be the anchor or the headwind or the bowline. No, it's going to be the storyline. It's going to be the narrative of the person navigating that ship.

And it's interesting, because our first inclination when we feel stuck, it's always to point out. Attribute our problems to the world in this predetermined position within it. Maybe that's the issue. We take our power. We put it into the universe, cross our fingers, and hope things work out. But that will always be a losing proposition. It will always come crumbling down. Because it's not the world that keeps you from showing up. You're not physically incapable of taking that first step or growing or evolving, developing, becoming something new, know that demon lives in your head. That's the mental Goliath we struggle with, right?

Because there's cognitive dissonance between who we know ourselves to be and who we want ourselves to be. That's the sea we have to cross, the terrain we have to navigate. It's not the physicality of time. taking the steps. Anyone can do that. It's believing that you are worthy of the journey. And you have to ask yourself,

is it that you can't become something new? Or is it that you can't, won't refuse to detach from who you used to be? You're still tucked away in that container, that box you've been building for years and years and years that you've placed yourself in, because I can promise you. One of the most liberating things to understand is yesterday is not a life sentence. Yesterday's not forever.

Yesterday's not defining. It's simply a stepping stone. And every morning when you open your eyes, sun comes through the window, illuminates life around you. That's never your cue to put on a fake smile, play the same role you've been playing day after day after day.

No, it's an invitation to do anything you want to do. To begin again. To start fresh. It's an opportunity to detach from that character. Detach from the people and the things that don't push you towards what you want. Detached from the negative self-talk. And when all that's gone, everything is removed and it's only you and your self-belief a will to move forward, I promise you that pendulum shifts.

Life becomes simple and how beautiful simplicity is. It's shining a spotlight on what matters. It's clarity. It's taking control. It's picking up the clay and molding what you want to mold. It's opening the door and deciding to walk through. Everything else is variable. Everything else is noise.

Everything else is detail and distraction. Because what you want, it's there. And it's waiting for you to simply remove yourself from who you used to be. To step into right now and believe that you are worthy of everything else. When I was a kid, I saw everything upside down. I remember spending all my time in the now, right? I hadn't yet learned to contemplate worst-case scenarios. When I was a kid, I was pretty much detached from reality.

And I'd have my Ninja Turtles and Power Rangers battling on the bedroom floor. I hadn't learned that playing with action figures doesn't get you a job. When I was a kid, I wanted to be the next Steven Spielberg or play in Blink 1282, or maybe be the president of the United States. What excited me, I gravitated toward. I hadn't yet learned that the statistical likelihood of accomplishing something like that was 0.001%.

When I was a kid, I was so captivated by imagination that I wouldn't even want to go to bed, right? The excitement and the mere possibility of the world around me kept me awake. I hadn't learned to settle down or go with the flow. When I was a kid, I did what felt right. I was led by curiosity, by a sense of exploration.

I hadn't yet learned to weigh the opinions of others or the pressure of conformity. When I was a kid, I saw everything upside down. And when I was a kid, I was right. And perhaps there is no message more important than that. to move forward without leaving the best of you behind. Not to grow away from what matters most, but to grow into it.

See, every so often, I take a step back and I look at the world around me, pushing, pulling me to be something I'm not, and I think back to my younger self. A life without walls or barriers, a life in pursuit of happiness, and I'm always amazed at how fast an example, exceptional existence becomes a checklist.

Look, life changes, responsibilities change, parameters shift, but it will never be wrong to ask yourself what matters. Are you waking up for you or for something or someone else? So stop, look in the mirror and decide which way is up and which way is down. Because the journey awaits. Why chase down the difficult things? It's certainly not being productive for the sake of being productive. It's not for the flex or the trophies.

It's because meaning in life is directly tied to conquering the unconquerable. Harnessing the outside world. It's about seeing what we can be. come when we put ourselves in position to grow. The adventure of a lifetime that awaits anyone who chooses to accept. That's why. But it's not a one-and-one affair. That's the thing.

Life has a way of filtering out the timid and the unsure to identify those that really want it. as though it sees us sign that dotted line and asks, is that so? Let me remove that comfort and predictability, see if then it still sounds good. Let me place the value on the other side of the pain. See if you're still enthusiastic about the pursuit.

In fact, let me burn the map, dim the lights, add some obstacles along the way, see how giddy you are about. all this now and see the difference between those who make change and those who dream about change comes down to one simple thing how do you view the obstacles are they a problem are they an anomaly a red flag because if they are you've lost before you started but the ones who see adversity as simply the expectation the water that grows the seed, the wheel that turns the car, the switch that lights up the room.

Well, for them, it's a little different. They have armed themselves with adaptability. See, life is not smooth sailing with aberrations in the form of rough waters. No, it is a non-stop influx of trials and tribulations. You can't be mentally prepared to evolve if your expectations. and your hope is always for calm. No, flip that on its head. The expectation is turbulence.

Calm is a rare gift, and as it turns out, you were built to endure. So when the waters are rough and the many turn back you, you push forward because this is not the world saying no. It's certainly not a reference. not a referendum on you, it's the cost of admission.

A chance for you to prove yet again that where you place your focus to emerge victorious. If only the world could see, could understand that the challenge isn't the problem, it's the answer. If only everyone knew what you know, that the great tragedy isn't falling down, it's avoiding discomfort in order to preserve what mediocrity. Why do you want this? Because you know it's an option. It's there. You know that if you move forward when you're fearful,

push harder when it hurts, find something in yourself when there appears to be nothing left, the game of life becomes one of unending reward, beauty, and prosperity. for those few, it's simply knowing that you can have the world if you just give yourself permission to take it. Good morning, welcome to your world within daily. Today, we're going to talk about keeping your head in the clouds and your feet,

simultaneously managing the big picture and the small stuff. Non-stop belief that things will work, that there's an answer, that you're ultimately going to get there, and that you won't quit until you do, while also being brutally honest with the facts on the floor, the reality around you. A lot of times I think there's a tendency to conflate

positivity with a detachment from reality. But they're very different things. You need them both for success to unfold. You need the big picture and you need the minutia, the steps, the little things that add up over time. In the book, Good to Great, Jim Collins calls this the Stockdale principle. Or Admiral Stockdale, I think at the timing. commander Stockdale was shot down during Vietnam. He was prisoner of war for over seven years

in Vietnam and it's just obviously a brutal experience. And, you know, one of the things that helped him survive was being painfully pragmatic while also knowing in his soul, right, with every ounce of his being that he would ultimately get out, that the men he cared about and helped so much would ultimately get out. And so when Jim Collins is interviewing him, he says, Admiral Stockdale, what differentiated the ones that made it and the ones that didn't? And the answer is incredibly surprising.

He says optimism, because the people that were overly optimistic said, we'll get out by Christmas. And Christmas comes, and they don't get out. And then they say, okay, we'll find we'll be out. We'll see our families by Easter. And Easter comes, and they're still there. Okay, maybe next Christmas. Next Christmas comes, nothing changes.

He says, those are the people that died of a broken heart. There was too big of a gap between the reality, the components needed to progress the way they wanted to progress and the way they were thinking. You know, you have to be willing to look in the mirror. and diagnose a situation. You know, that's applicable to business, it's applicable to your personal life.

Dream big, step small. Believe, but act. Be cognizant of the world around you, the reality that you're living in. You can't change something that you don't understand intrinsically. You can't progress if you haven't analyzed something. And this is not about your case.

This is never a call to doubt yourself. It's to be strategic. This is just saying that you need to understand the realities so that you can improve upon them. If you want to be the next Michael Jordan, that's a huge ask. That's a lot. It's possible. You can do it. And you need to believe with every ounce of you that if that's what you would,

want to do, it's a pursuit, you know, worth taking. But you also need to know what it means to be Michael Jordan. You got to understand the commitment, how he sacrificed relationships. He sacrificed, you know, his friends, his love life. He got up every single morning. All he did was basketball. how he took thousands of shots a day, how his mentality and his aggressive behavior, right, his mindset, the way he looked at life and approached life on and off the court. It required that he was so intense and so obsessed with winning that some people couldn't handle it. It meant that everything stopped except being the best. that's a big ask

a lot of people can't do that don't want to do that but that's what it takes and to think you're going to be Michael Jordan without understanding one, the commitment that's required and how you stack up

it's going to be in vain I remember the CEO of the company that I work for at out of college he used to say look you have to be able to be honest and say when your baby's ugly look at what you have and be able to draw a line from where you want to be. So you can fix it. So that's the point.

If you can juggle those two things, you'll be unstoppable. Unstoppable. If you can be the one to trust yourself enough to know that there is a big picture, you will pursue it relentlessly and you will get there. If you can take that and you can marry it to the little things, right, to the awareness, to promising yourself that you will continue to analyze, assess and do what needs to happen on the ground, that you will be realistic, you will be pragmatic. When things fail, you won't sugarcoat it. You'll dive in. You'll look at why it failed.

So that you can pick up those pieces and build something stronger and continue to build and continue to build and continue to build. stack and stand on what you've made. Those are the people that change the world. Those are the people that get things done, that get results. Dream big, step small. See you tomorrow. There's a quote attributed to Lincoln. He says, be sure to put your feet in the right place, then stand firm.

The other day I was listening to Dan Carlin's podcast called, hardcore history, which side note is an incredible podcast. Guys, a brilliant storyteller. And as I was listening, there's a specific idea that I wanted to dive into, an idea that I believe if we make an effort to understand and fully commit to, is capable of changing our lives. But first, some quick context, right? So Dan starts off this episode called King of Kings, talking about,

the Battle of Thermopy. In the year 480 BC in ancient Greece, it's that famous story that a lot of us know, where King Leonidas leads that small army which includes 300 Spartans against this massive Persian military

force that's invading. And the quick version is essentially Xerxes, who's the king of the Persian Empire and in charge of that massive army, tells the much smaller Spartan force. that if they lay down their weapons, if they submit to him and let, you know, the Persians pass,

no harm will be inflicted upon them. They'll be free to go, go about their lives. And here's the famous line. In response to the Persian command to lay down their weapons, the Spartans respond, Milan-Labé, which means come and take them. It's a Spartan's way of saying, look, the only way we're laying these weapons down is if you rip them from our cold dead hands. Right? With everything on the line, the odds stacked against them, the ground beneath them, basically shaking from the march of a far superior fighting force moving directly towards their location,

they would not let go of their principles. They were fighting for something bigger than them. And I couldn't stop thinking about this idea long after I hit pause on the episode. I guess I was awestruck by the power of living life with that type of conviction. Because I know in my soul that's a North Star I should be gravitating towards. We all should. The strength to be unrelenting with regard to that which we care about. The aforementioned quote from Lincoln about finding the right.

place for our feet and then holding steady. With everything you have, all that you are holding firm. I just couldn't get that out of my head. And then it came to me that that invading force represents so much in our personal lives. So many things. One example, being the difficult or adverse circumstances, our trying times, our trying times when you're most likely to concede that perhaps you're no bigger than that world around you. Maybe life is a movie and I'm merely the audience. My job is to clap, laugh,

gasp, or cry. Am I cog in a wheel, a line in a script? Powerless. In which case, you should be reminded of Victor Frankel's famous observation that everything can can be taken from a man but one thing, the last of the human freedoms, to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way. In other words, the outside world may change. It may evolve, but it will never have power over how you choose to internalize and view what's happening. That's innately yours.

So when the circumstances feel like they demand more than you can give, when they suggest you leave your interpretation of life behind, the correct response is, as the Spartans defiantly said, come and take it. That army could represent a pushback against your values, the pillars of your individual foundation that you feel amidst all the pressure tempted to let go of. After all, it's easier to retreat than stand toe to toe to with others. It's easier to abandon than it is to defend, at least in the short term. But as Victor Hugo writes, you have enemies, good.

That means you've stood up for something sometime in your life. The enemies, obviously not being the point. a believer in the conservation of enemy approach to life. Allies just pragmatically get you a lot further, but here's the reality. Anyone who stands for something will undoubtedly create divide. They'll be criticized and condemned. And when one feels the pressure of that criticism, they must understand that it does not invalidate who they are or their worldview.

That is yours. You are the only one who can give them. up or relinquish that control. So as the Spartans said, come and take it. And then lastly, my thoughts went to little things that make us who we are. Those tiny pieces of ourselves that we little by little, one by one over time give away, the concessions that fade into the background as we evolved to fit in so that we don't stand out. As Emerson, and beautifully put it, to be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment. And so that attacking army just might be the universe attempting

to mold you to it, perhaps not all at once, but more like that frog placed in water and put on the stove, but the heat increasing so slowly over time that he doesn't realize the heat will soon overtaken. Externalities do not dictate. They are objects in need of meaning and you are the architect here. If it means something to you, it's worth holding on to during the difficult times and the easy time. When it's popular and when it's not, there is value within you specific to you, a value that must be nurtured in order to expand. Others can't and won't see that. The world around you may even with all its complexities

seek to suppress it. But that flame is there. It's there and it's yours. And to anyone or anything looking to extinguish its light, come and take it. After all, what is a life if not one lived on your own terms? The goal is not to simply exist, but to define the plane on which you'll evolve, to devise your own parameters. Be yourself as that world looks to make you something else.

So here's to digging deep, to finding within yourself the courage to stand up to the great armies of chaos, conflict, adversity, and their perpetual conquest. to remember how strong you are, how much control you have as you navigate the unknowns and redefine the right nows. Don't let your strength be the thing you give away. Don't let your heart be what gets left behind. Don't let your thoughts become illusions of what could have been if only you'd held on. And look, I'm not saying it's easy. In fact, I know that the meaningful road will necessarily be the one that requires the most of us.

That makes us question who we are and where we're going. It will ask that when our minds race with doubt and our knees shake with fear, we find a way to stand regardless. To walk to our demons, look them square in the eye and proclaim that whatever it takes we are willing to give. that we will fight until there's nothing left, go until we can go no further, and hold with conviction all that matters most. So the next time light demands that you fall back or bow down,

the next time chaos emerges in the distance and asks only that you lay down your arm. Here's to being strong enough, certain enough, courageous enough to say one thing and one thing only come and take them. When it comes to the almost 8 billion people on planet Earth, there's undoubtedly a variance in the resources at our disposal, the influence we have. What we all share is the ability to rule over our own lives, our own thoughts.

As Thoreau said, think for yourself or others will think for you without thinking of you. See, life moves quickly. And if one is unable to slow it down to examine the world around them, well, they'll find themselves a cog in the wheel of their own existence, a pawn on the chessboard of life. Because reality is a battle. A battle of self-interest that requires that we build walls around. on that which is precious that we protected it all cause. Your worldview is the foundation for everything of value in your life,

yet it's constantly under attack. Attack from the negativity at the gate, the suffering, attempting to breach the walls, the outside influences praying that you'll outsource your thinking, that you'll let them rule from afar. To maintain control over your own outlook, It's no small feat. It's perhaps the most important battle of your life.

It's the difference between intentionality and chance. The role of the ruler or the ruled. As the saying goes, if you don't build your dream, you will spend your days building someone else's. If you don't ask yourself what you want in life, those needs will ultimately be buried under nonsensical, obligation that takes their place, where there are vacuums in awareness that you will be filled, usually not by actors with the same interests as you.

See, mistakes are not the problem. No mistakes mean you're present, driving towards something, collecting data for this experiment that is life. It's autopilot that destroys. Like that frog put in a pot heating up so slowly it never knows. to jump out, the external world becomes its demise. And this message isn't to instill fear or intimidate. It's to remind you to ask the question that so few ask. How is my life best lived and what can I do to bring that to reality?

If you can think for yourself, you're never out of the fight. If you can think for yourself, you're always a decision away from advancement in the direction of that which matters most. So trust you to do what's right for you. In a world where no one knows what they're doing, I can assure you you don't need external endorsements or stamps of approval. Take Robert Frost's road less traveled by and don't look back. Don't feel remorse. That's where you're forced to find yourself,

to ask the tough questions to embrace who you are. Because the crowd is antithetical to wrap. Rationality. Not just because responsibility dissipates. Not just because human beings become essentially well-dressed chimpanzees, but because rarely on the micro level is the collective goal, your goal. Have the courage to see that. Have the courage to understand that life is not an instruction manual. Everything around you, you have in one way or another accepted. And in accepting it, you have chosen it. By not saying no, you have in fact said yes. So realize that the world around you doesn't change until your thoughts become the bridge that connects current to future,

today to tomorrow. Until you realize life can't make you a victim or a pawn on its chestboard without your permission, whether implicitly or explicitly. No, you have the ability to think, control, orchestrate something great. greater than what's in front of you. Let today be your next courageous step in the direction of that reality. I woke up, put my coffee on the desk, opened my laptop, stared at a blank screen, and a little button popped up in the top right corner.

Check for updates. Nope. Ask me again later. Why? Why not now? I don't know. I don't necessarily care about the improvements. I guess it's just inconvenient. It can wait. And that's kind of it. Let's face it, the laptop doesn't matter. The update in this scenario is not important. But bear with me because I think what it stands for, and when you apply it to the big picture, does matter. Our proclivity to take less because less is convenient. Our predisposition to sell ourselves short because it's safer to leave so much of ourselves on the shelf because while things don't break when they're on the shelf.

But you can't be both flawless and live your life. Because life comes with wear and tear. The value is the experience. And a flawless existence is void of experience, of stories of adventure. There's a little parable about two seeds being planted, and one of them just wants to grow, wants to feel what the sun is like, wants to see how high she can get,

experience the breeze, the cool air, and so she grew. And sure, she dealt with hard days. She had her difficult times, but ultimately grew to live her best life. The other seed worried. Worried about leaving her home, the world that was the ground around her,

worried about damaging her roots, worried about what could be waiting for her in the dark, about the sun being too hot and the breeze too strong, and ultimately stayed right where she was, playing it safe until one morning a chicken came wandering by and ate the seed off. the ground and see this spells out a few things. One, we can at any moment

decide to step into that next level, evolve into that next chapter. But also, not doing so comes with a cost, sometimes a hidden cost. There's a tendency to think that preserving the status quo because it's safe is valuable. But understand,

something, you are not a collector's item. You weren't made for preservation, you were made for growth, to expand, to reach out towards the heavens and feel that sun, that breeze, ensure upgrading means vulnerability. It means accepting that the unknown is bigger than you, but also contains within it everything you need. Whether it was people, things, money, resources, I used to think like that seat. How can I hold on to what I have? Contain, play small, I can't lose this, I've come too far, I've worked too hard.

What if everything goes wrong? I can't upgrade now, maybe later. Maybe someday when the time is right, when it won't hurt or require that I'm, I step outside of this little world I've created, but guess what? Growth always asks of us that we leave the comfort of now. It always offers us the world in exchange for the courage to see the unseen and trust ourselves to bring it to life.

And when I realized this, I saw how the act of trying to perpetually maintain the status quo is debilitating. It's looking at life through a life. of scarcity. It's only when you start to grasp how abundant life is that you realize by simply stepping into that person you are destined to be, you'll attract what matters. Some things will go and you'll leave them behind, but those things no longer serve you. They played their part, they added their value, and are now merely stepping stones as you move. to something greater, and that's just it.

Sometimes living means wishing you did things differently, looking back and acknowledging that you need to be better. Sometimes living means losing the wrong people in your life to make space for the right ones. Sometimes it means spending days, months, even years wandering down the wrong path so that you can get a glimpse so that you can realize what you can realize

realize what the right path looks like. Sometimes it means no reward, no validation until that compounding finally takes place. Finally, you see just how powerful those small steps were and will always be. It means seeing yourself as the person you know you can be. Maybe not necessarily the one you are today, but betting on yourself when no one else would.

There's an idea that people are neither good nor evil, but they have both within them. They choose through their day-to-day action, how they'll live, who they'll be, and sure this is a tad oversimplified, but I think the duality is useful, right? Because in a different context, for everything that occurs in your life, you can find a reason to celebrate or a reason to grief, a reason to grow, or a reason to hide. it all comes down to what one chooses to see, how they choose to look at the world.

I'll never forget when Peterson talked about curtains, right, with tears or holes in them, same world on the other side. But the opening that you choose to look through paints an entirely different picture, right, contributes to an entirely different understanding. And look, I'm a pragmatist, I just am. I'd never ask people to close their eyes and pretend everything's perfect.

to wander down the path before you, expecting everything to be easy. No, but what I am saying is that the path before you is where you'll uncover the meaning in life, and meaning requires that we are from time to time uncomfortable. To go where we most want to go, we must leave something behind.

And the reality is that while it's scary, while it can be alarming and even painful, it is always worth it. That what's on the other side is what makes life worth living. I want you to know that you don't need to be walking into the same rooms,

talking to the same people, doing the same things. No, not if you've outgrown that reality. Not if you're ready for the next chapter. So let's make a pact to view life not as an obligation, but as an opportunity. Something,

challenging but beautiful, mysterious but plentiful. Let's view the challenges along the way, not as something going wrong or some kind of alarm, but rather an indication that you are doing something right, that you're stepping into the controlled chaos of your day-to-day, finding the courage to meet new people, try new things, take risks, evolve. This is what life is about.

And if you can find it within yourself to see it that way, to be grateful for the discomfort that makes its way in and out of our lives, you'll know that you are evolving, reaching towards that sky. Because the danger, as far as I'm concerned, is never what happens along the way. It's what doesn't happen because we never let ourselves accept what the world had to offer. So on that note, I think today is the perfect day to upgrade. Just go. Sure, things will feel strange at first. Abstract at first, wrong at first.

It's incredibly difficult to separate from the past. It's hard to detach from the deeply rooted biological whispering of, hey, at least you knew what to expect back there. But that whispering has preservation in mind, not happiness. And at some point, we need to stop preserving that which is not ideal. So go. The walls that once existed, they'll crumble. And this will be startling at first.

shocking at first, intimidating at first. It's incredibly difficult to watch foundational structures crumble around us, especially when you know you are the one that lit the fuse. It's hard to walk away from the faint murmur stating, hey, this was your home. How dare you leave it? But those words they have, status quo in mind, not growth. And home is an idea you take with you. It's no set of parameters. Just go. The stories you told yourself, the narratives you thought were forever,

will prove to be nothing more than the end of an underwhelming chapter. This will feel abrupt at first. Unfair at first will leave you deeply unsatisfactory. at first. It's incredibly difficult to realize that happily ever afters aren't linear, they're cyclical. It's hard to walk away from the voices pleading with you not to turn the page, stating that because their realities will remain the same, so must yours. But those aren't the characters with whom you'll emerge victorious. Some movies must be recast. The setting reimagined, the hero reinvented. And so it should be known that your greatest strength is the little steps that you are capable of taking.

The little decisions you are capable of making. And remember, safety is not safe when it keeps you from what you need. and the wrong nows have a tendency to evolve into the wrong forever. The small concessions, well, they become the big mistakes. So if it's a sign you're hoping for, let this be it. If there's a time you're waiting for, let now be that time. If it's someday you are dependent upon, let today be that day, as doing nothing is in fact a decision,

but only one of many. One path laid out before you, one single grain of sand, where the edge of today's world touches the shores of tomorrow's. Sometimes it's about the end of the edge of the edge of today's world, ability to stand up, face the horizon, and just go. Go, because it's only upon going, that you realize you're capable of the journey. You finally see in yourself the strength you've longed for. It's in going that you realize yesterday's situation wasn't even really the problem. It was your fear of the unknown. of leaving that situation.

It was living with the devil you knew. Instead of potentially having to face the devil you didn't. That's what happened to your wings. They just felt safer, tucked away. But it's in going that we acquire perspective. The tragedies, the devastation, the things that kept us awake at night, they really weren't that bad.

But how are we to know? When you build walls around yourself, what's within them becomes your entire world. It's in going that you create yourself. And while everything you need is already beating in your chest, the great unknown before you is the water to that seed, the key to that door, what you fear is exactly what you need. And so the beautiful dance through life, through life goes on.

Not beautiful because of its elegance, it's rarely that. But beautiful because of its promise, its malleability. Beautiful because we get to move without answers in order to find answers. Beautiful because what we become is directly proportional to what we're willing to endure. And that means that the universe doesn't judge. It doesn't know us by our failures or our mistakes, but by our courage. Our courage to face all of these things and move forward anyway.

To relentlessly explore the resilience of the human spirit, an infinite light in an otherwise finite world, a bridge that is built beneath our feet in real time. a weight off of our shoulders to know this. We don't have to get it right. We just have to step out the door trusting that we will pick up enough pieces to put together something meaningful. We just have to go. And then the world, it opens up. Just like that. Leave the old, embrace the new, simple you think to yourself. Well, yeah, of course, the best things in life are Always simple. Always have been, always will be. We just imagine them to be difficult.

We have a knack for making simple decisions into complex matrices of cause and effect. Pros and cons, wins and losses. We learn to think for years. Until we finally come to the brilliant realization that happiness, that meaning that a life well lived comes when we think less. Ready, fire, aim, there is no perfect path, just an adjusted course, an endless series of change, of learning that falling is just a road sign indicating where we need to go next. You can't plan for that.

You can't chart a course that doesn't exist. No, you leave who you were yesterday behind and you set sail. They'll ask you where do you see yourself in five years and you'll think who knows. But not here. It couldn't be here. It must be somewhere evolved. Where pieces of the world shaped your outlook and became the armor that you now wear. New game, new rules, new expectations, new people, new places.

And what really changed? well, how you view yourself. It's funny how it all works, how things come together when we look over our shoulders, like it was meant to be, as if this had to be the way things are. No, you could very easily have stayed dreaming, looking out that window, wishing you could leave, hoping for answers that didn't exist. And so the complex now feels as simple as we meant it to. We move forward, not knowing, but trusting, and we look back with the sense of understanding

and a confidence that was built over time. In the game of life, there are people who go and people who stay. People who build and people who don't. And I'm not saying everything will be perfect or everything will immediately snap into place. How could I? But what I am saying is that in moving forward, we pull back the curtain. on the opportunity that is available to us. We move from the physical limitations of the bodies we walk around in and towards the infinite power of the mind that powers them.

We become who we were always meant to be. How do we know what that is? Well, not until we look over our shoulders, of course. So go. Go make your mistakes. Go learn your lessons, feel your moments of pain and your moments of bliss, your times of doubt, and your times of certainty. Because in doing so, you will have done the very thing so few people get to do with their limited time on this planet. Truly live. So go.

Just.