I don’t mean to be morbid, but I’m going to touch a little bit on the imminent reality that is death. It’s nothing to be afraid of, in fact the best thing we can do is embrace it.

A classic stoic philosophy is “Memento Mori” which translates to “you will die”. Once you embrace that truth and understand that your days are numbered, without fear, you’ll feel liberated to start living.

And that’s why for today’s quote I want to tie death to gratitude - “Waking up is the first thing to be grateful for.”

This hits in two different ways. There are people going to sleep tonight who won’t be waking up. They’re old and sick, and they’ve lived their last day, breathed their last breath, and moved on to whatever’s next. What they wouldn’t give to have another youthful, care-free morning to wake up with the world ahead of them. That’s what you have today, even if it doesn’t necessarily feel like it. So take advantage of it!

And then equally important, there are people waking up this morning for the last time and they have no idea. Accidents happen, it’s just the way things are. Imagine if they knew that this morning was the last time in their life they’d be opening their eyes to start a new day. They’d treat it much differently wouldn't they? We feel invincible in the face of these tragedies and figure it would never happen to us. But it could. Anything is possible. So let’s live like there’s something on the line because every day, there is.

So every morning when your alarm goes off get in the habit of rehearsing two words - “Thank you”. Thank you for another opportunity to experience a new day. Thank you for the miracle that is life and a fully functioning body. We have so much to be grateful for, not the least of which is the chance to live out another 24 hours.

While this isn't necessarily a new perspective, sometimes we need to be reminded of what we already know to really understand its meaning.

One of the fatal flaws of humanity is that we are hard-wired to do what feels good in the moment. We fight this daily battle between the pleasure of the present moment (instant gratification) and the payoff of delayed gratification. Unfortunately, the way this usually works is that the things that are less pleasurable in the immediate are better for us in the long-term.

One of the many ways that the mind tries to seduce us into short-term pleasure is by making excuses and exceptions. This is an irrational story our brain tells us to influence our decision making to do the comfortable thing. To stay warm and cozy instead of getting up and going to the gym because “you need the extra rest today”. To put off that difficult conversation for another day because “you already have too much going on.”

These logical arguments all serve to do one thing - Keep you from taking uncomfortable action.

The other fatal flaw that impacts our good intentions on a daily basis is how we’re also hard-wired to conserve energy and take the path of least resistance. Making excuses is a the permission to do exactly that.

The problem with this is you later regret the decisions you made, making you feel like you lack discipline in key areas of your life. This evolves into feeling less self-confident and a sense of less self-belief, ultimately making it even harder to take corrective action. It becomes a slippery slope where it’s easier to compromise on your standards the next time and demands more of you to do the same amount of work.

The antidote to making excuses, and the way to interrupt this spiral, is to be clear on your intentions and feel accountable to enforcing them. It’s less appealing to sleep in and not go to the gym on a Wednesday morning when you’ve made a commitment to work out on Wednesday mornings, especially if that’s a decision you know you’ll need to answer to.

If you want to become more self-disciplined, and have a way to be greater than that voice in your head making all those excuses so that you take positive action anyway, you'll want to check this out!

There’s an expression in the military that goes “Stay ready so you don’t need to get ready”. For them, it’s a matter of life or death but for us it’s an opportunity to seize the moment.

You never know when you might get your “lucky break” or that “once in a life-time opportunity”. As ambitious, growth-oriented people we’re always looking for our breakthrough that takes us to our next level.

What a shame it would be if you missed out on it when you had the chance.

That’s why it always serves you to be ‘on’. To be ready, to be alert, and to be prepared. The amount of energy it takes to get yourself ready is significantly more than it takes to maintain your readiness, not to mention how much more unreliable it is that you’ll be able to arrive at the desired state when you need it.

This reminds me of the classic example I share that’s about pumping the well. It might take a while and a number of pumps to get the water starting to flow from the well, but once it is all you need to do is keep pumping and the water will keep pouring out.

So the task is to keep pumping the well of your life, to stay ready so you don’t need to get ready.

In my opinion this involves two things. One is that you need to make sure you’re mastering the fundamentals. You’re consistently taking care of your mind, body, and spirit so that you maintain a heightened capacity. This involves basic health routines like exercise, healthy diet, quality sleep, and mindfulness.

Then the second is, as Abraham Lincoln puts it, you’re always “sharpening the ax”. It’s continuing your education and learning to broaden your perspective. It’s practicing your pitch or skill so that it’s primed and ready to go. It’s all about being proactive so that when the opportunity arises, you can give it your very best.

Staying ready is a daily process. It’s a ritual. And if you want to make the most of the moment, you need to be ready to go at any given moment. And that separation is in the preparation.

I’ve had a really incredible lesson hit me from a few different angles recently. I’ve been working on a project to interview my grandma and record it to capture her life story. At 89 years old she’s telling me what her life was like at different timestamps of history and technology, and it has really been making me think.

Then alongside that I just finished a TV series called “The Men Who Built America” that talked about how certain innovations like electricity and cars permanently changed the way people do things in the late 1800s.

The similar conclusion I’ve drawn from both of those influences - People are resilient. They figure it out and accommodate to the circumstances and environment they find themselves in.

Darwinism or ‘survival of the fittest’, which is the mechanism for evolution, teaches that it’s not the strongest or most powerful species that survives, it’s the most adaptable. And humans are highly adaptable. 

This lesson plays in a few different fields. Let’s say someone experiences a traumatic injury - a limb is amputated, something causes blindness, whatever it might be. That new circumstance becomes the new normal very quickly. That’s not to say that things are the same, they certainly aren’t, but they become normal. The same goes for the world around us and how we adopt new technologies and standards of living.

And therein lies the opportunity - You can manufacture your environment and establish new standards to create your new normal.

This reflection also makes me think about what unimaginable inconvenience we are tolerating right now. Similar to how before kerosene and electricity night time was basically dark (and that’s just the way it was), what realities of life are we experiencing now that will be inconceivable in the future? It’s just another example of how we get used to whatever is around us.

At the end of the day it’s all a matter of awareness. We don’t know what we’re missing out on. We don’t know what difficulties we’re currently experiencing. And pursuing that perspective gives us new eyes to see where the world is headed, and how we can make the most of it, and make a difference.

We’ve been seduced in today’s society that we need more things to solve our problems. Having trouble at work? Try this new software and automation. Feeling lonely? Join a new gym or social club and meet new people. Want to have a healthier diet? Buy the latest nutrition program with all the gimmicks and guarantees.

The truth is, you probably already have everything you need to overcome that challenge at work, to strengthen your relationships, and to prioritize your health. You already have the tools, knowledge, and ability to make progress on whatever it is that needs to be addressed. Yet still we look externally to solve our problems.

This is where I want to make an important point - It’s not that we need new tools to make advancements, we need to get better at using the tools we already have.

It’s unfair to say that a software isn’t working for you if you’re only using a fraction of its functionality. It’s premature to move on from a strategy before you experimented with different ways it might work. It’s silly to throw away a book because you’re trying to read it upside down. 

The value is there and it’s in plain sight, nothing about what we have access to needs to change. It’s our ability to use it that does.

So in order to overcome this hurdle, I have a recommendation - Understand that you need to invest time to get something to work better. Even though you want instant results, you need to invest in your ability to produce those results sustainably. 

This is one of the primary points in Steven Covey’s book “The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People” where he talks about the difference between ‘production’ and ‘production capacity’. Sometimes things need to get worse or delayed before they can get better and more efficient.

Known as a learning curve, once you overcome that threshold of ability you can start scaling and exponentiating the output you get from any given input. That’s what leads to efficiency, predictability, and sustainable returns.

I was listening to an incredible podcast episode between Ed Mylett and Lewis Howes and learned a valuable distinction between success and greatness. This insight is a centerpoint to Howes’ new book “The Greatness Mindset”.

Success is a very elusive thing. We often associate it with achievements, accomplishments, and accolades. There’s an extrinsic component to it that motivates us to attain a certain thing. I’ll be a success when I get a raise or a promotion, when I buy my dream house, when I win that award. It’s almost conditional in nature.

The problem is, as we delay our self-perception of being successful we inadvertently postpone our happiness, believing that we’ll find it when we’re successful. This is only until we realize how empty it is once we hit the goals we set for ourselves, and they weren’t fulfilling.

Even though we’ve been taught to change our relationship with success and define it for ourselves so that we don’t get trapped by comparing ourselves to others, it is still very self-centered. At the end of the day it’s about your goals and dreams.

As I paraphrase Howes’ philosophy - Greatness is actually what we’re after, not success. It’s about engaging other people in your goals and dreams so that they win with you. There’s a shift from ‘me’ to ‘we’ that the best leaders in the world can espouse and inspire in the people around them.

With that in mind, let’s take a pause. You’re motivated, ambitious, hard-working, and committed to making the most out of this gift called life. How can you make it more other people? How can your example be the torch that other people get to follow toward their goals and their dreams? 

It’s a subtle shift… But the more you can lead from a place of service, the more you'll actually experience the deep fulfillment you’re chasing. We all have greatness inside of us, and Lewis Howes’ new book just might be your way to tap into it! You can check out Howes' new book by clicking here!

An unavoidable part of life is controversy. Controversy happens when there’s a disagreement that escalates to massive levels, becoming seemingly irreconcilable. Many people have a natural response to unconsciously exacerbate the situation, making things worse, which of course does way more harm than good. Hopefully the perspective I share today helps you to overcome that.

The core psychology is - When you find yourself being challenged, or that your conclusions are being put into question, it activates a response to get defensive. It comes as a threat to your worldview which you desperately want to maintain. In that way your response to the stimulus is a great mirror for psychological safety.

This causes many people to dig deeper into their opinion, close their minds to alternative explanations, and become much more difficult to negotiate with. At this point, being on the right side of the controversy isn’t just about the immediate facts in question, it has become a representation of your self-image. Very quickly, the stakes can get very high, which is why it’s so difficult for disagreements to reach a good resolution.

So if you find yourself in a controversy, where your character is being put to the test, you too might feel yourself getting protective and defensive. The next time this happens, here are a few things you can do to intercept the thought pattern.

First, think about the ideal outcome. It probably doesn’t involve being in a petty battle with someone. It likely will encourage you to acknowledge and incorporate the other side of things and be empathetic to their viewpoint. Even better if you can communicate this mutual positive outcome.

Then second, I’d encourage you to delay any kind of significant response. When emotions run high and we’re caught off guard, it may provoke us to respond in ways that are out of alignment with who we want to be. This is a core tenet of stoicism - Not letting your emotions influence your decision making. Take some time and slowly let the emotions wear off by doing some deep breathing or using perspective in your self-talk.

We’d all like to think that we have the presence to be our best selves despite adversity and difficult moments. They will inevitably come, and hopefully you feel a little more prepared to have integrity the next time you find yourself in one.

For our entire lives we’ve been told that it’s a bad thing to be selfish. That it’s bad to be self-centered, to lack consideration for others, and to only care about your own profits, pleasure, comfort, and well-being.

Overall that thought might be true, but there are extra layers to it that I think are a bit misunderstood. Many people overgeneralize the sentiment of being selfish and therefore don't take good enough care of themselves out of fear that doing so would make them selfish.

The first thing to clear up in the definition: It does not mean that it’s not okay to put yourself first. In other words, you should prioritize your own well-being. It’s that maxim of ‘filling up your own cup before filling up someone else’s’. Your capacity to give to others is limited by your personal capacity.

With that in mind, here’s a tangible perspective shift. A lot of people have the desire to help others. They want to change lives. With that intention, why doesn’t your life count? Is it not impactful to change your life, is that not a meaningful life made better from your actions? When you consider that you are a person just like those you hope to help, you see that you’re just as worthy of your time, attention, and care as someone else may be.

Do you know what is selfish? Humble The Poet has an interesting thought on this. He says it’s “expecting other people to put you first”. When you make demands of others or feel entitled to something from someone else, that’s selfish. Their priority is to prioritize themselves just as your should be to prioritize yourself.

So with that in mind, let me ask you a question. Feelings of being selfish aside, what is one thing that you so readily are giving away but you’re in need of yourself? Yes, the fastest way to get anything in life is to give it away, but that requires that you’re open to receiving it.

People tend to glamorize things and today I’m going to give you the truth, using the metaphor of running a marathon. 

When we have a goal or project ahead of us the one thing we’re looking forward to, that motivates us, is the sense of accomplishment we’ll get when we hit the finish line. It’s that moment where you get to reflect on what you just did and remind yourself of what you’re capable of.

And it’s anything but easy. There are many challenges, setbacks, and obstacles that get in between you and the finish line. You hit the wall and you need to fight through. You get a cramp and you need to take a break. You miscount your miles and realize you’re not halfway yet when you thought you passed it a while ago. 

But do you know what is the most difficult part of running the race that is often overlooked?

It’s getting to the starting line. 

The main reason people don’t experience the fulfillment of running a marathon doesn’t have anything to do with the race itself. It’s everything that happens (or doesn’t happen) before the race even starts. 

There are countless people who commit to running a marathon in any given year but only a fraction of them do. And the fall off doesn’t happen during the race, it happens in the steps before.

Metaphor aside, this is true for everything. The hardest part to anything is just showing up. It’s making the commitment, deepening your investment, being serious about what you want, and then beginning to follow through. 

We often wait to feel a certain way - motivated, inspired, in flow, or for the time to be right - in order to take next steps on what we want. But that waiting is better described as delaying, postponing, or wasting valuable time in pursuit of what you want.

Maybe you wish you would’ve started sooner. There’s a Chinese proverb that goes “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time to plant a tree is now.” If you can make the decision to get yourself to the starting line, today, so that you can begin the process of getting what you want, then there’s your next step.

And this is where I”m giving you one last opportunity to do exactly that - to get that hardest part behind you once and for all. The 21 day Best Self Breakthrough Challenge starts today, March 6th, and it’s not too late to be a part of it. Together we’ll install the 2 habits that activate a life-time of high performance so that you start getting more done in a day than you do in a week, and get more consistent with the meditation, exercise, and self-care habits that make you feel at your best. And you can make the choice right now to step up to the starting line, to see your path forward toward your fullest potential, and to start moving forward.