There is a principle in any competition. If you’re outmatched by a competitor, you need an ally that outmatches both of you. When a kid on the schoolyard is being beaten by a bully, he may bring his older brother to the fight. When a small country is being trounced by an International bully, a more powerful ally can be called upon to take ‘em out. In business if your financial and human capital is not powerful enough to withstand a hostile takeover, make an alliance with an even more powerful company to maintain your identity. The examples of this type of thing are numerous.
Who is my bully?
I have a bully that needs to be beat. It’s my lack of discipline. Discipline has many antonyms, including chaos, confusion, procrastination, negligence, disorganization, and permissiveness. All of these enemies encircle me to prevent me from realizing the value that comes with discipline.
In order to be healthy, all I need to do, is have enough discipline to not be stagnant more than 23 1/2 hours per day. The rewards from simply showing my wife that I want to stay alive and spend time with her would be astounding. The rewards to my own self-image and ability to play with my kids would be worth it alone. Living longer is good. Being on meds is bad. How hard is this?
Bring a Bigger Bully
I have to bring a bigger bully to the fight. I enjoy good food, I enjoy beer, wine, whiskey, and sitting to watch movies or read. I don’t enjoy exercise.
But there’s a bigger bully.
I’m also competitive.
Ridiculously competitive.
A friend recently invited me to join a competition that involves putting $50 into the pool, and the only hope of getting paid is to drop more body fat percentage than the other 36 competitors. Another way to earn a smaller percentage of the pool back is to log more workouts than the other competitors. I can even be thwarted or thwart others by logging a 2nd workout in one day!
I’m starting this competition at 218.8 lbs and 30.0% body fat.
I’m pitting my competitiveness against my lack of discipline.
My father has always been there for me, and continues to this day, working for me in areas of my businesses that I prefer not to engage. I truly appreciate his support and always-positive perspective on the undertakings of my life. But today isn’t about my father, it is about two men who contributed to my childhood who were each step-fathers in their time. I will call them by the names that most people will recognize for they truly were Clint Eastwood and John Wayne.
Clint Eastwood was more from the Every Which Way But Loose era than anything else. He was basically an easy going guy, a house painter who drank Hamm’s (the beer refreshing) and drove an old ’59 Chevy pick up with paint that would come off on to your hand if you rubbed it. Clint spent most of his time with his shirt off, and if it was on it was a plain white Tee. He was skinny, but wirey and a tough fighter. My mother made it a steadfast rule that corporal punishment was off limits so the frustration level Clint had with a snarkey kid must have been through the roof. There was one very special day where he helped cut the gum out of my hair (thank you Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) and spent some sober time giving me decent advise for a 9 year old getting into my first business.
Clint brought romance to the table. I remember participating in elaborate towel-hulas involving Elvis on the turn-table and a pineapple ham baking in the oven in our trailer to surprise my mother when she came home from her grueling job. He would go to great lengths to make a paint-for-trade deal to secure a chicken coop to contribute to my mothers dream of an organic sustainable family farm. We lived in the dirt, we bartered more than anything, we waited in the government cheese line and visited the food bank to survive, but there was a touch of romance that Clint Eastwood brought to the table.
My first business was a 4-H swiexne, and the first pen for the swine was a bunch of pallets that came to us from somewhere strung together with bailing twine we saved from the ton or two of alfalfa the horses trudged through over the last winter. There was a half-round tank that served as a water vessel, and we did purchase a fairly new feeder, that could dump 50 lbs. of food at a time and keep it dry and out of the mud, serving the pork chops as they needed food.
Shelly was my 4-H swine coach, and he said “OK” so much that I started counting, and subsequently laughing at his mannerism. He was a solid man though, and he raise a gaggle of well put-together daughters and a son, who all seem to be doing good things with their lives.
Clint was with me for my first big business move, the 4-H tournament at the county fair. I lived in the camper on the back of the truck for the whole week, and Clint was with me to see me through. When I had some free time from grooming my pork tenderloin, he took me to the fairgrounds to see the exhibits and ride some rides. He even gave me spurts of independence that, at the age of 9, seemed like a charter to explore the uncharted depths of the Amazon rain forest.
Mr. Eastwood was a bad-ass, he carried himself in a dont-eff-with-me sort of manner, and he fathered my half brother. His brand of idealism and Italian ingenuity has stayed with me in parts for years.
John Wayne was a different story. I suppose I should just call him Rooster Cogburn, because that would peg him more nearly, but there were some qualities that transcended the narrow ways of Rooster. John Wayne walked bow-legged and carried a .45 sidearm into the woods, whether that be the deep woods or just around the house. His family was of utmost importance, most Saturdays the whole family would be blitzed, and John Wayne would call someone and get patched through with 3-way calling, which cost a small mint in those days.
I’ve been dancing around the boxing ring with a heavyweight opponent 100 times my size for years. Discipline. I just don’t want to take it on the jowls from him, he looks like he can hit hard.
A few threads are coming together. One, I’m finding that my ability to write good, worthwhile posts hinges on discipline. I just posted two that I had started weeks ago but failed to follow through on. Today I wasn’t able to add anything of value to them, so I simply posted them to illustrate to myself what a crappy job I do when I don’t stick to doing one thing at a time and doing it well.
Two, my health requires discipline. Eating right and exercising are critical for my long term goals, which include survival. It’s all about discipline to stick to the plan day in and day out, rather than sprint for a bit and then turn around and be lazy.
Regarding the mental disciplines, I bought myself a beautiful journal this weekend. It’s hand made buffalo leather and handmade parchment, bound together with strands of buffalo leather. Incredible piece of art, something truly valuable. My goal in buying it is to encourage the quiet, slow, unplugged discipline of writing, thinking, reflecting.
The shiny lights beckon don’t they though? The TV, computer, mobile, ipod, and more compete for my attention. The subtle ways of a buffalo leather journal don’t stand a chance. For that matter, the looks on my sons faces don’t stand a chance. Being honest here, not proud of it.
Taking the Easy Way Out
I’m guilty of taking the easy way out. When I sit down at my workstation to attack the tasks of the day, I find myself gravitating to the easy ones, and procrastinating those which require more effort. This reality goes against every philosophical value I hold dear. I suppose admitting I have a problem is the first step to recovery.
The toll this takes is immense. My relationship with my wife, the most important relationship I have, sometimes requires tasks that are more difficult for me, like making plans, being thoughtful, and so forth. These get sidelined just as easily as anything else that isn’t screaming in my ear at the moment. I don’t like the fruits of this behavior, it must change.
Change or Die
Change or Die. The fact of the matter is that given the option of changing or dying, most people will die. The author of the book by this title wrote a nice excerpt for Fast Company a few years back, and it continues to be a powerful read.
Don’t think there’s a conspiracy? Why would my very own 10 year old son, when I ask him why I’m riding him so hard on getting his homework done, tell me he needs to do good in school so he can go to college and get a job working for a good company? He’s 10. And he’s my son, who has only known me to work a straight job for about 4 years of his life, only 1 of which he could possibly remember. I told him about the statistic Jim Rohn elucidated about 95% being dependent on someone else for retirement. I asked him if the plan he just told me sounded like a winner and he understood that it is not.
Our education system is designed to create good employees and good soldiers. It is not designed to teach our children how to think. It’s not designed to teach our children how to succeed, or be happy, or fulfilled. It’s designed to make good obedient little cogs for the Military-Industrial Machine.
Truth is this conversation with my son came from him not bringing home some of his homework because he was following a rule about where he was supposed to be during a certain time of the day, and missing out on the big picture of doing well in his schooling. Following the rules. That’s what the schools really teach.
This audio clip caught my attention because of Jim’s mention of walking around the block.
Jim Rohn…
Richest Man in Babylon
Walking around the block for me is literally a life-saving practice. I learned this when my health issues started, and my wonderful bride found this little bit of education for me.
A number of years ago I found myself pondering values and purpose. I was all but divorced, had a 3 year old son, was in a dead end job, had been diagnosed as depressed and put on Prozac (fluoxetine) and didn’t see a way forward.
A man who has become a friend, Forrest Christian, helped me to frame my issue in the realm of legacy, seeking purpose and significance. I think I met him through the now-deceased Internet Monk, who also had a great impact on my view of the world. Here’s what I boil it down to.
Time. At the end of everything, every single one of us has exactly one immutable asset. If you’re born with a silver spoon, the statistics show that you’re most likely to go from great wealth to great debt within 18 months of your benefactor. If you’re born into a dirt poor family from the third world in a war zone, you still have time. Time is the only thing we truly own. We do not own our relatives, as much as some of us treat them as property. Homes, cars, gold, groceries, any physical goods are all temporarily on loan. You can’t take any of this with you.
Each day we go to the Bank of Time and make a withdrawal. We don’t know what our balance is, we don’t know if we’re getting low or have a great wealth stored up. I really enjoyed the movie In Time for illustrating the “monetary” value of time.
If you want wealth, you have to trade time for it. Yes you can leverage time for greater monetary return, but you’re still making a trade. It makes sense to make a leveraged trade, but make no mistake, you don’t earn money without spending any time. Often the plan is to trade time for money, so that when we have enough money built up, we can trade the money for time. We call this retirement. Why are we making such a silly trade?
Tim Ferriss, in another way of wording it, seems to understand the silliness. If you haven’t begun reading Four Hour Work Week I recommend it, as it is designed to send shock troops into your lethargic brain and motivate a new train of thought.
William Wallace
The real issue isn’t time though. Time is just a function of freedom. The real value is Liberty, Freedom, or as William Wallace says “Freeeeeedooooommmmm!” There are a few basic facts about freedom that we need to discuss. It’s an abstract concept, so what do I mean when I say I value freedom?
Freedom is an issue of time and resources. If you have no money, all the abstract freedom in the world doesn’t do you any good. If you have plenty of money but are a wage-slave to earn it, you have no time to enjoy it. If you’re not deciding what to do with your time, you’re not free.
Why do I care about freedom? I believe it is an inherent right of every created person. It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Simple as that. People were not created for slavery, we were created for freedom. I find that I cannot abide enslaving others to find my own freedom, and I cannot abide being enslaved for an others freedom. We’re each responsible to take our own birthright.
If our birthright is freedom, and time is our only asset, then why do I waste it?
Time wasting
The reality is when something is difficult or stumping, I fill my time with something easier. For instance, when I sat down to begin writing this, I couldn’t find a place to start so I started upgrading plugins on the site, installing new plugins, which led me to updating my Amazon account. Yesterday I spent some of the time updating my Adsense account, installing plugins, and so forth. I would never have considered myself afraid to dive into the hard stuff, in fact I consider myself quite willing to jump in where alligators fear to tread. But I have to be honest with myself, much of my time wasting habits have developed out of fear. I’m afraid of owning my birthright.
What am I afraid of?
Incompetence. Maybe I’ll think of something else, but for now all I can think of is incompetence. If I feel like I may not do a good job…. no it’s more serious than that. If I feel that I may not be brilliant at something I fear going into it. I expect not only to be competent but impressive in all that I do, and I fear that I do not have what it takes, much of the time.
Setting Forth
Setting forth, I must have courage, fight the fear, master my time in order to enjoy my birthright of freedom. Perhaps I’m not the only one struggling with this?
Hello and Welcome. Today is my 33rd birthday, and it seems that everything must change. I find that I process things better when I write about them, so this blog is meant to be a way for me to organize and track my own adventure. I’ll be talking about my new efforts at Lifestyle Design, it’s time to take control of my life and make it what I want it to be.
Where am I?
At this point in my life I have two kids, am married to an incredible woman, run two businesses with several peripheral business projects ongoing. Since December I’ve been “retired” – really just staying home. We’ll get to that later. My life is wonderful, but something is amiss.
What is amiss?
On December 17th, while hosting about 100 people at our customer appreciation Christmas party, the left side of my body suddenly went numb. It felt like 1/2 of me had died. I sat down, the EMT’s came, and by the time they got there, things had started to come back, but I still “tingled.” I spent the rest of December resting and int he hospital, working with the pediatric cardiologists (I have some congenital issues) and the Stroke/TIA/Epilepsy people. I had 2 MRI’s, CT scan including corotid, EEG, two ECHOs, blood tests, vitamin deficiency tests, and everything else you can imagine. I have high blood pressure and cholesterol, but those don’t numb 1/2 of your body from scalp to toenail. All the tests came back normal. There is nothing they could find physiologically, chemically or structurally wrong with me.
Now what?
The only thing that doesn’t show up on any tests is stress. What I’m finding is that my symptoms recur in certain types of stressful situations. I’m a type-A kind of guy, I’ve piled my life high with responsibilities and duties, and it’s taking a physical toll on me. I’m scared – when 1/2 of your body goes numb, you take notice. Something has to change. No, everything has to change.
Inspiration
I didn’t come to this place without some preparation. Last summer I started connecting with a man named John Samuel, author of Living in your Zone who essentially predicted that something like this would be the result of me continuing to work the way I’m working. He evaluated me according to his criteria and said I was made to be a Problem Solver (more on this to come) and the energy I am spending maintaining is draining me and causing me undue stress.
Additionally, my beautiful wife bought the 4 Hour Work Week book by Tim Ferriss some time ago, and as I’ve been home recovering she rediscovered it and nudged me to begin reading. The diagnosis is in from John, Tim is providing the prognosis. I’m realizing that the way I’ve built my life is killing me.
