Your World Within Podcast by Eddie Pinero - Once You Learn This, You'll Never Be The Same | Powerful Motivational Speeches

Episode Date: October 30, 2023

"My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it, but love it." - Friedrich Nietzsche

There's a Latin phrase pronounced Amor Fatih. It's one of the more powerful ideas I've come across. Its translation means love of fate. It implies everything that happens is good, with the very least necessary. And I think we need that reminder from time to time. Because, funny enough, it is one of the first sentiments to leave us when we're in trouble. when we're down or lost, the idea that everything has its value. And sure we don't always understand it in the moment or when we're fighting through it,

but that circumstance or even tragedy, and the great play of life has a crucial role. Someone recently sent me a beautiful clip from a Stephen Colbert interview. I want to dive in, but there's a caveat. There's a caveat. I ask that you listen to this in a vacuum. For our purposes, I'm not going to be the Stephen Colbert who mocks half the country on live TV every night. This is the wise Stephen Colbert with a lot of value to add

because he can be both. To frame the interview, he's sitting across from Anderson Cooper, and Anderson's asking him about something he said a while back. Anderson reads the quote I've learned to love the things I'd most wished had not happened what punishments of God are not gifts Anderson then looks up from the paper looks over at Stephen and asks

do you really believe that to which Stephen responds yes it's a gift to exist and with existence comes suffering there's no escaping that You can't pick and choose what to be grateful for. A truly incredible emotional moment. It is the realization of Amor Fati.

Even the most trying of times are a bridge to something. Even that which is taken away creates a space for one to ultimately find what they need. A couple years ago, I did a keynote in Hollywood Beach talking about those difficult situations. Some of them are external, but some of them we create. Chaos, self-induced, that opens the door to the most precious of occurrences. Things that I never would have had or arrived at, if not for the pain, the sadness, the confusion. It truly all fits together. And so I basically take a trip down memory lane, talking about the physical duress of a cold morning run.

Wouldn't you know it? It strengthens one's conviction and belief. in themselves or the sadness in leaving someone you care about, someone you love, knowing it's no longer what's best for either of you, but was necessary. Touched on the fear. The physical resistance I felt walking on to stages in 2015 and 16, dreaming of off-ramps, thinking of excuses in my head all the way up until the mic was in my hand on stage and words came out of my mouth that propelled me to comfort and confidence in sharing my voice. Again, it's all one big puzzle. Every piece matters. You don't get ups without downs.

And as you push forward into the next thing and the next, as you see the breadth of the unexpected and the power of the unknown, you learn. You learn that the so-called lows aren't the exception. They're not a problem to be solved. And as I sit here now, I even view them less as a cost than I once did, a pain that must be endured. No, it's all worthy and deserving of our gratitude. It all matters. It's all precious.

I talked about on a recent episode, getting migrants. And one of the days I remember more than any other in my life, and I'm 36 now by the time this episode's released. I have a few days under my belt. This one was truly memorable to me. I was having a debilitating headache and a ton of pain, finally able to fall asleep. And I remember waking up, opening my eyes and realizing.

realizing that the night had finally slipped by. Morning arrived. And I felt good again. I slowly got up, kind of tilted my head back and forth, testing the waters, all clear. I walked outside, down to the beach, and as the sun came up, I sat on the lifeguard stand and just looked out in awe.

The sand, the waves, the seagulls, the sky. it all meant more in that moment than it ever had. I was just beyond grateful to be there. And so you talk about the lows being gifts. You know, I get it. It sounds cliche at best, maybe even ridiculous. But those lows, I swear by it, always seem to give me the things I'm most grateful for.

It's a pattern that constantly repeats itself. They always remind me that the magic is the stuff I walk right by. They put me in hell for a period of time so that I understand to exist beyond that space is a mirroring. Without Lowe's life's beauty becomes a baseline. And when something is a baseline, it's definitionally average or regular, it's money I've learned to love all the things I'd most wished had not happened. What punishments of God are not.

It all matters. It all brings you something. And if you're at a point where you're so deep in the weeds or so far in the trenches that you've forgotten, I hope this finds you and lifts you above it all. I hope it reminds you that you will arrive at the place you most need to be. And it will be not despite but because of this path you walked that you arrived there. Some people live their entire lives waiting for miracles. And some people realize they're already in one and act accordingly.

I hope today you choose the latter because it is a gift to be here. It was an ordinary run on my ordinary loop on an ordinary day right in the middle. of an ordinary week. I rounded the last corner that I'd encounter before finally returning back to the street that I lived on. Beautiful sunny afternoon. I remember the sun bouncing off my skin, the sweat dripping down my face.

I was looking ahead, but not really at anything, more so lost in my thoughts. Then out of nowhere, this little butterfly kind of swooped in, appeared right beside me, and it seemed as it floated through the air to link its pace with mine, effortlessly gliding. I looked over at it and back at the ground, over at it again, back at the ground.

And for a second, I wondered what it would be like to be one of those flying machines, the ones built for flight navigating the sky with no restriction. What a feeling that must be. And as I looked over for a third time, it had slipped back into whatever types of things are important to a butterfly on a warm June day, but realized, as I carried forward, alone again, that for a few seconds we were side by side. It in the air and me on the ground. I hung in there with the flying machines.

That's right. The creatures with wings designed specifically for flight, I was for a time amongst them. So what truly separated us? See, my whole life, I have drawn lines. The lines that separate them from me. From can and cannot, from possible and impossible. There have been times where I saw reality is pre-packaged.

Basically as though you get what you get, factory, stock, out of the box. It took a long time to see what I wanted. And instead of saying, hey, must be nice, or they have it made, to instead ask, how can I reverse engineer that outcome? What do I need to do now to get what is ultimately available? Because it's very available and it's very real. Just because you are not built like those flying machines doesn't mean you can't run alongside them. Join their ranks.

Become one of them. The thing is, instead of drawing walls and building parameters, you have to give yourself permission to adapt and evolve. I was thinking about this the other day, as one of my best friends was sharing some of the work he does with his real estate portfolio. He was talking about some of the lessons learned on social media, and it was met with resentment, disdain. You have X, I don't. You make Y, I don't. You came from Z. I didn't.

And I read the comments, I just shook my head and thought, they don't know. They don't know. He grew up on a farm in Michigan, spending a long time working for less than minimum wage. They don't know that he put himself through college. They don't know that he took out alone, having no clue what he was doing and learned how to renovate a home by himself.

See, here's what he didn't do. He didn't point up and say, wow, look how free they are. Must be nice. No, he asked, how do I run alongside them? I am not an observer. I am a flying machine. Because the truth is, we can do so much, become so much.

Once we've erased the mental lines that we've drawn over the years. Once we give ourselves permission to join that little segment of reality, we've deemed to be ideal but have yet to walk towards. Nothing happens to the ordinary moments, the ordinary days or weeks or months, until you realize ordinary is just a label you've been placing on the pathway to extraordinary. Everything you need is there

except your past willingness to walk through it. And today is a new day. You will take to the sky in your own life when you stop drawing lines around everything you want and compartmentalizing it is not for you and instead run alongside the life you want as though it was already yours. Life is not a game of those who are and those who aren't. It's a game comprised of those who will and those who won't.

Those who see how they can and those who see how they can. You can wish, hope, and watch time fly by, or you can join the ranks of the flying machines that leave all that behind and take to the sky. Les Brown has said, you don't get what you want in life, you get who you are. If you put the man together, the world responds. You build yourself up, evolve, life around you will transform. Someone once asked me on a podcast episode about imposter syndrome, why I think it's actually a very positive thing. My thinking is imposter syndrome is a sign that you're in an arena somewhat foreign.

to you. You're trying something new, playing the student. Anytime you do that, of course you're going to feel out of place. You have to. You don't grow without putting yourself in an environment in which growth is possible. We have to shake up the old in order to create the new, and it's that process, to Les Brown's point, that makes us who we are. It creates our reality. Jim Rohn has said something similar in that it's not what we have, it's what we become. Having something is one thing, sure. But building yourself up to be someone who can repeatedly go out and get that thing over and over and over again, well, that's something different altogether.

Are you willing to be that vulnerable to start on the ground floor and work your way up? Because here's the deal. There have been many times where I knew I had to be more than I've ever been in order to obtain something I've never had. And if I aim to live life to the fullest, and I do, realizations like this will only continue. Everyone knows it's painful when there's a delta that exists between what you want and what you're currently capable of having or acquiring.

That's a tough realization. And what epiphanies like that tend to do is leave you with a few options, right? You can run away or get better. You can surrender and find something lesser or become worthy of that thing you want. Talk about a difficult conversation with yourself. Acknowledging that you're currently not where you need to be. The ego does not like that. It's uncomfortable.

It's why so many people raise the white flag. and run, can be much easier to shake your fist at the world around you than it is to delve into the one within you. Joseph Campbell has said the hero's journey is inside you, throw off the veils, and open the mystery of yourself. Close your eyes and imagine a world where you aren't scared to go after what you want, to grow along with your dreams, your goals, aspirations, where you walk directly into that space. your curiosity is begging you to explore.

Where you condition yourself to depersonalize the criticism and failure and instead focus on the becoming. That's not some crazy proposition. You're not being asked to go perform some miracle. It's simply about giving yourself permission to evolve into what you can become, allowing water to nourish the seed that is your soul. soul. When you look around you and feel the very human thought that is, I wish something about this was different, I challenge you to be courageous enough to point in and ask, how can I make it so? How can I level up and become the type of person that has X, that gives

Y, that experiences Z? You are capable of filling that gap. Again, I'm able to feel that not a negotiation with the world, but an agreement with yourself, to accept more discomfort in your life in exchange for the upside that comes with it. There's something to the saying, don't wish it were different, wish you were better, because again, it places power and control in your hands to evolve and make it reality. It's crazy to me how easy it is, and because of that, how much it's, how many people complain about something their entire lives without owning the change becoming the person who lives differently sees differently feels differently it's all there you get in life who you are and how incredible that who you are never ends it's limitless if you're willing to push

to grow and change it is your ticket to the ride of a lifetime. Deciding who you'd like to be most often starts with leaving the parts of you you no longer want to carry around. So reminisce. Think back,

examine, because you didn't just arrive at today. This moment is the result of thousands upon thousands of steps and conversations and decisions. our lives are sculpted like ocean shores one wave one gust of wind at a time and sure there were certainly events that expedited the process

but the point is holistically landscapes take time to materialize as did this one but you're not confined to this moment In fact, you in and of itself is an idea. You is a story that incorporates the things you used to do, places you used to go, people you used to know. You is not right now. You is how you summarize the path that created right now. But you can change because you will always mean what you can. decide it does. So reminisce, think back, examine, and feel the warmth of the good times, bask in the moments that lit up your soul. But don't be afraid to pull back the curtain on those

things that, well, maybe you aren't too proud of, the things that no longer defined you, perhaps never defined you to begin with. Because see, before we cut ties with those stories and send them out to see, we must do the hard work of recognizing what they are. Before we can identify the life to be lived, we have to be able to see the one that will live no more. And so it's okay to walk down that road. Those things are no longer you. They are ideas, old ideas, bad ideas, And so they will be relegated to the sands of time. They played their part as everything does. And now it's time.

So reminisce. Think back, examine, grab what you love and let it become your guiding light. Take hold of the meaningful and pour it into the new you, the one you're making now, the one that matters. now. You'll need it. Because the old you, it'll try to reemerge. It'll present itself in the shape of old faces with old expectations. Old places connected to old habits, old stories that just don't want to end. But these characters, they played their part. And thank God they did, because now they're

recognizable. Now you know to cut ties. You know, I wish it weren't so. I think we all do, but sometimes life requires that we touch that burning hot stove in order to understand that it's hot. It's easy to dismiss these occurrences as a bad thing or wasted time. But I think they're a beautiful thing.

Recognizing and mitigating our mistake leaves us with a new foundation to build on a blank canvas. It makes you not a prisoner, to yesterday's work, it makes you an artist again, a designer, a creator. So reminisce. Think back and examine, but not to hold on. Reminise to let go. To say the goodbyes that will make space for the hellos. To free yourself of excess that will make space for the necessities. You've spent a long time designing you. Some of it ideal, but all of it valuable in its own unique way.

The reality is that now, in this current moment, not all of it needs to come with you. So reminisce, think back, examine, so that before you move ahead, you know exactly what needs to be left behind. The other day I woke up with the plan. Three things I had to do. So I wrote them on my whiteboard. They were essentially my objectives for the day. But it ended up being one of those days where things didn't unfold the way I anticipated.

And for a variety of reasons, curveball after curveball, with some sloppy decision making sprinkled in there. Eventually morning became afternoon, afternoon became evening. I found myself exhausted and looking up a day. And looking up at a whiteboard that was showing me I had accomplished none of the things listed. And I hate that feeling. Having clear objectives and not meeting them. And so after dinner, I got a phone call, and I found myself talking about how I fell short,

getting it all off my chest, letting it all out there. And I got that reassurance that I wanted without even realizing that I wanted it, right? the voice said back to me, Eddie, this happens. It's not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. No one's perfect. You put a lot of pressure on yourself. Tomorrow's a new day, right? That type of thing.

And it's like, okay, exhale, time for bed. And the next morning, I was outside relaxing, doing some thinking, and came to this point. And you'll see how these dots connect here in a second. But essentially, I see life as a staircase, right? where we thrust ourselves out into discomfort, into chaos, and then amidst the storm, we're forced to grow. We step into shoes. We were once unable to fill,

and what was once bigger than us is now normal. It's every day. It's ordinary because we fought for it. We pushed ourselves through. That's evolution. But now, guess what? That old ceiling has become the floor. It's time to evolve.

It's time for that next step in the staircase. Time to thrust ourselves back into the chaos of life so that we can again tame something bigger than us. Take the next intimidating thing and make it commonplace. And as I sat there outside thinking, I found myself to be at that next step, ready to leap out again. into the tumultuous winds of life. But this time it felt different. There's an intersection, and I talk about it often, of doing what adds value to the world

and doing what makes you content personally. Okay, I think where those two things meet is peak living. That's where the magic happens. And I'm fortunate enough that these thoughts, speeches, episodes, videos, whatever you want to call them, on some days, literally reach over 200,000 people, and that's not meant to be a humble brag or anything like that. It's just to me so incredible that I can't process it, right?

I get emotional thinking about it. My dream is to add value to other people, provide that little lift that might help someone look at their own problems differently, maybe see a path when before they were unable to. That's what it's all about. And then, in addition to that, a parallel track, on a personal level, feeling like I'm growing and evolving as well,

constantly stepping up those stairs one by one, having the courage to continue fighting those unknowns and making sense of life's complexities. That's why so many of you are on this journey with me. And so as I looked up at that next step, and it felt bigger than it ever had before, I knew the task needed to be bigger than it's ever been, which would require of me one of the biggest changes I've ever made, and that scared me to death, knowing that in order for something to be born, something must die. Something must be left behind. I'd been stepping forward for years,

and thank God for that, but now it was time for a leap. And so back to that whiteboard I mentioned earlier. If you hang in with me long enough, I usually come full circle. Right, back to the list of goals I miss, the bad day. Why am I so fixated on that? Well, it has nothing to do with the day itself. Everyone swings and misses from time to time.

It has nothing to do with those three goals. Everyone falls short here and there. That's part of life. It's about the person I want to be as I endure those turbulent times. It's about the strength to handle my own chaos and battles differently. Before you can lead others, you need to lead yourself. And that means being vulnerable. It means being honest.

It means looking in the mirror and asking yourself the tough questions. It means being stronger. than I've ever been. There will be times that require of me that I push forward without having to hear from my parents or girlfriend or buddies that everything's all right. The next step requires that I trust myself

to be the guy in my own life. To have impact in the world, one must find strength within themselves where they didn't know it existed. This is a leveling up that I know is required for me to be more than I've ever been, stronger, bolder, more confident

when I'm most fearful. There was a line I used to draw separating me and the people I look up to. And the moment for me was a message. I knew it was time for me to mentally remove that line. You'll never be more. more than you envision yourself to be. It was time to be my own answer.

Promote myself to that next level, from the kid with the dream to the man that makes it happen, it's time. It's just simply time. Even the ones I love, the ones closest to me, they can't provide that. Has to be internally derived from a place so deep that come hell or high water, it's happening. And telling people about my little misfortunes.

so that they can pat me on the head and tell me things are great. That's antithetical to what is required of me next. There is a level of courage and strength and excellence in all of us that lives at the bottom of this abyss that we must pull up with everything we have until it becomes intertwined with who we are and where we're headed. And as I sat there, I knew it to be true. I couldn't help but feel that change was about to happen and it would stem directly from how I see myself.

It would be the product of who I knew myself to be. And so now, most importantly, I present this question to you. Are you at that next step? Are you looking at a chasm that must be crossed? Were all your little decisions, all the current current and discipline and strength that you utilized to get here, that has positioned you for this moment, is it telling you something is next?

Is it time to dig deeper and be more than you have ever in your life been? In my example, by the way, was not about holding in our problems or dismissing those around us. Asking for help and we need help is courage. The small circle we surround ourselves with is a direct reflection is a direct reflection of who we are. No, for me, it was about being the type of person who trust myself to weather those storms.

About moving with greater conviction. Graduating from going to be to is currently. That whiteboard, that phone call was the turning point, and nothing more. And my example may fit your life like a glove. You may think, wow, that's exactly the lens I need right now. But maybe it's not. Maybe your situation is a little different.

Maybe the road you're on is newer, less traveled. Maybe it's the courage to take that first step, to play the student. Perfect. Because whatever it is, as you look up at that next step, what matters is that you know in your heart and soul that you have what what it takes to become that person. It's not bigger than you, it is you. Someone once told me that the world will not believe it until you do.

So believe. Believe it like your dreams depend on it because as it turns out they do. As it turns out everything about your future is make believe until you breed life into it. Look around you at your current reality. Remember that it is a product of what you've allowed and that at any time you can up the ante climb the step, reach a new level. You have it within yourself to do that. Just give yourself permission to be that person.

And it will be scary. It's going to hurt at times. But let's be that vulnerable. Let's be that vulnerable. Let's show the world what we can create when we move into it as though it's ours. As though destiny isn't assigned but written one beautiful act of courage at a time.