Your passion and your work

Don't find work your passionate about. That is self-centered.

Do the work you should do and learn how to be extremely passionate about it.

A check up from the neck up

We have more access to information and technology than ever before.

Most of us do not have to produce our own food by raising crops which means we have more time.

Most of us reading this blog have two days for leisure activities to do what we choose. We can vote. We have internet access and cell phones. We don’t live in fear of our government. Most people around the world do not have these luxuries.

Shopping is a leisure activity for many of us. To others it is the most stressful activity imaginable. Most of us reading this blog (including myself) cannot comprehend what it means to only make four or five dollars a day; the very idea that if you mess up a purchase means someone at home suffers. In other words, if I were to leave the store and drop my eggs I would be frustrated but not crushed. If I drop those eggs only making five dollars a day, someone goes hungry at home.

If you made over $30K this last year, you are in the top 1% of income earners in the entire world but many of us walk around like the system is broken. No it’s not perfect but it's definitely good enough; more than good enough.

What I am simply saying is that some of us are living in too much fear. Making money is not evil and having possessions is not a bad thing. Be mindful of the stories we tell ourselves though. Separate our wants from our needs. Shed unnecessary labels - it's not good nor bad, right or wrong. We all need a checkup from the neck up: we live in the safest, richest country the world has ever seen in the history of mankind. Let's start acting like it.

It's not where you start

It's not where you start but where you finish.

It doesn't matter that you didn't come from money.
It doesn't matter what gender you are.
It doesn't matter what your ethnicity is.
It doesn't matter what kind of education you have.
It doesn't matter where you were born.
It doesn't matter how old you are.
It doesn't matter how you look or sound.

Don't worry about the constraints: Google's home page is so simple but yet so brilliant because the founder, Larry Page, was limited in his abilities to code. The beauty of Twitter is that it is limited to 140 characters not 140,000.

What does matter is that you are willing to start something that is so ridiculously hard, a project so big, that it consumes every bit of you; a project that will make a difference in people's lives.

Why does it matter?

Because you will be different in the end and the people you touch will be different too.

We are made

No one is born to be a doctor, a lawyer or a blogger. 

We are all made.

By saying we are made makes us feel uncomfortable because now we are accountable. Now we are on the hook.

What a shame for the person who was supposed to cure cancer but they never got around to it or never realized their potential. What a waste. They could have helped so many people but now we will have to wait.

Smaller tribes

Johnny Carson had ten times the audience of Jay Leno. Now Jimmy Fallon has even a smaller audience. 

Carson wasn't necessary better; he just had more attention when there were only four stations to choose from (not a thousand).

Tribes are smaller now. Back then you had a bigger audience but with only a few microphone. Now everyone has a microphone (Facebook, Twitter, Blogs). Now we can communicate, assemble the tribe and share a connection. Now we have choices to seek remarkable work. 

Too much weather

It’s funny listening to people talk about the weather.

When it is summer it is too hot or there is too much inversion.

And when it is fall of course the trees are too dead or there are too many storms.

When it is winter it is too cold and there is too much snow.

People seem to look forward to the magical time of spring, that it is one of the best times of the year. Then the 72 degrees day with blue skies comes someone complains that their allergies acting up too much.

We just need to be happy with our surroundings. There is beauty in every season (not just in the weather).

Preparing for the path

Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson completed the Dawn Wall Project in January, 2015. It was immediately crowned "the hardest climb in the world." The climb received national attention from all over the world. Spending 19 days on the wall to complete a 7 year long project, Caldwell put together a lifetime of climbing to set the new standard of what can be accomplished in the climbing world. 

This was without adversity. What began as curiosity, a spark captured the attention and imagination of the world. Why? Rock climbing, the sport, does not bring a ton of inherit value as shall we say being a doctor or a teacher. But yet watching someone overcome, to do the impossible, because it has never been done before inspires each of us to find our own Dawn Wall and climb it. 

Caldwell says his father as a huge inspiration and taught him "Don't prepare the path for your children. Prepare your children for the path." 

While it may be easy to say, "This guy is lucky to be blessed with such talent. I could never do something like this." His "overnight success" is the sum of 7 hard years of determination and vision and a lifetime of discipline. All this while losing a finger, being captured by terrorists, going through a divorce, etc.

This guy is the real deal when it comes to having the guts to say to the naysayers that anything is possible when you put your heart and mind into it.

What are you up against?