Month: October 2017

The Hidden Costs of Things

“The value of a thing sometimes lies not in what one attains with it, but in what one pays for it — what it costs us.” — Nietzsche

I am not a minimalist. 
I’ve got too many books to be considered minimally hip. (do people still say hip?) But I do follow some minimalist principles.

For example, over the past few years, I’ve adopted the principle of only buying things I love. (Socks. My sock game is strong.) If I don’t find an item useful, enjoyable, motivational, and relatable to who I am, what I’m learning and what goals are, then I’m going to get rid of it.

 

Hidden Costs

Everything we own has an undercurrent of powerful hidden strings attached. I call it the hidden costs of things. 

When you buy something — say for a hobby or skill you’re learning — you’re not buying the object — your buying the lifestyle. We don’t just buy a thing, we’re investing our time, attention, emotions, energy, money, opportunity, health and a host of other things as well. Even throwaway items have a hidden weight to them.

If I commit and invest myself into photography, I’m not just buying a camera. I’m buying the additional necessities. Lenses, straps, a bag, different kinds of cameras. (Gotta have me some sweet-sweet drone shots yo) Photography books, perhaps lessons. I’m investing in attention to the art of photography. I’m investing into the world of photography. And if I’m building a business around photography, I’m investing time in clients and relationships.

You are what you own.

Well, not really. ‘You are what you own’ is a good headline (or poster), I’m generalizing here. But you are influenced by what you own and how much you own. Not being aware of the hidden costs attached to your purchases can turn you into a slave of what you own. I’m not talking about bad purchasing impulses (although bad habits contribute to your amount of hidden costs). There is an emotional, physical, mental and spiritual weight to what you own and how much you have. The more you have, the more your attention is split. There’s only so much time and energy we have give to what we own. You’re time spent writing away on your computer is time you could be practicing piano or washing your car.

 

Space Costs

How much stuff do we own that we never use? Not only do thing take up physical space, they take up emotional and mental space as well. Are you holding onto something from your past? A photo of lost love, mementos you don’t love, but don’t want to get rid of. Go around your house and you will find closest and garages full of things you don’t need that are taking up mental space.

 

ToDo Costs

When you surround yourself with skills you want to learn, businesses you want to build, activities you want to pursue, you’re surrounding yourself with subconscious todo lists. Everything you own demands your attention. Some things weigh heavier than others, but everything has at least a piece of your attention. I don’t know about you, but when I have too many things demand my attention I feel completely overwhelmed and end up dropping everything.

One of the key benefits on minimalism is it keeps you focused on what matters to you. 

When you’re attention isn’t split between a thousand things you wish you would, could and might do someday (something I struggle with a lot), you give yourself space and clarity to be sharp and focused in on your most important things. Most of the time we’re not even aware of how much the weight our todos are barring down us and holding us back.

 

Lifestyle Costs

Unless you can afford it, buying into too many lifestyles at once is a great way of setting yourself up for not being able to give the time, money and energy each skill requires. It’s better to focus on one or a few pursuits at a time, that way you are able to give each the attention it requires to reach mastery.

I’m not wealthy (…yet). I don’t have multiple houses (h👹ll I don’t even have one house) but if I did, the weight of all of my stuff would pull me in a thousand different directions. I would worry about my stuff in my one house, forget my stuff in the other house and be everything but present in the moment.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not telling you to forgo all of your belongings and run naked in the streets. Instead, focus on what’s important to you. There’s nothing wrong with buying things you love. But Its good to pause and reflect on the hidden costs of what you have and are thinking about buying. By surrounding yourself with only the things you love and need, you will free your focus and energy to what truly matters to you.

Consider the hidden costs before buying. “Am I buying this because I want to, or because this is important to me?”

Touch and pick up things you own. “Do I love this?” “Do I find it useful or enjoyable?”

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner

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I Am a Perfectionist (And You Are Probably One Too)

I am not a perfectionist.

At least that’s what I thought.

If you asked me about it, I would have told you something clever (smart🌜ssy) like, ‘I’m not a perfectionist. I’m an exceptionalist’ or ‘I’m after excellence, not perfection’.  But if I’m being honest with myself, is there a big difference between the two?

It’s easy for Perfectionism to mask itself as many things, including excellence and fear. Without a clear definition of what excellence means to you, Perfectionism can turn your good intentions into impossible goals.

 

Perfectionism masked as excellence:

‘Oh, sure, I’m working on a music album, but right now my songs still need a little polish..’

 

Perfectionism masked as Fear:

‘Oh I can’t start a _________ (business, app, blog, book, ) I don’t know enough yet..’

 

Perfectionism masked as Indecisiveness:

‘Yeah right now I’m writing a book, but it needs a lot of work, so hopefully, I’ll have it finished within a year or so..’

 

Perfectionism masked as Distraction:

‘I bet I can write 1 blog a day, release three podcast episodes a week, work on my novel, exercise, practice guitar every day, pishh no problem’

…

I could go on and on. Perfectionism can disguise itself and become a substitute for what we actually want.

Perfectionism isn’t something we are, its something we do.

It’s a habit we fall into that distracts, befuddles, and limits us from our goals.

 

In his new book Finish, Jon Acuff talks about how goals tend to grow into perfection monsters. Our goals get bigger, complicated and have impossible timeless. All in the name of hustle, right?

You don’t  just want to run a 5K, You’ve gotta go big and run a marathon. (Even when you haven’t run a day in your life!) Sure you could write a book, but what if you wrote a five-book part series instead, wouldn’t that be better.

The problem, of course, isn’t the lofty goals, but our expectation attached to those goals. We expect to do more, and when we don’t have immediate results, we get bummed out and quit.

This insight really hit home with me. I tend to create huge goals and have big dreams for myself, but when days, weeks, months go by, and it seems like I’m still thousands of miles away from where I want to be, I feel discouraged.

One solution Jon suggests is to cut your goals in half.

I know myself — I’m always going to think BOLD and go after the biggest, baddest goals I can dream up. But instead of focusing on the entire goal all at once, why not cut the goal in half and focus in on a small portion that I can do without feeling overwhelmed.

Cutting your goals in half gives you perspective on what you can do next.

A goal like ‘I will writing a book’ has no edges you can grasp onto. It’s infinite, timeless, and impossible to completely wrap your head around. ‘I will write one crappy page a day’ has edges and it’s easy to grasp. You know what you have to do and it doesn’t have to be perfect.

Tim Ferriss and Neil Strauss have talked about something similar. Focus on a small goal for the day that seems tackle-able.

Write one blog post, or fix one bug. Once you blow past that goal, you’ll be ready to hit another. Don’t just floss — aim to floss only one tooth. It’s so ridiculously small to do, that you’ll go and floss all your teeth anyway.

 

Q: How can you take your goals and cut them in half into bite-sized executable tasks?

— Keep Pursuing,

Josh Waggoner

Note: This post was intentional written imperfectly. 🙂

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The Biggest Issue with a Multi-Disciplinary Life

I’ve been reading Total Focus. From the beginning, Brandon Webb talks about the idea of One Thing. 

“If you can’t pour yourself 100 percent into an idea when you start it, then you’re starting it half-assed, and you’ll never have more than a half-baked plan. When you have a half-baked plan, you can’t expect any more than a half-baked outcome.”

“By nature, most entrepreneurs have some form of attention deficit disorder..
‘Yeah, I’ve got three startups going,’ and I don’t need to hear any more, because I already know how that story ends. You may think you’re going to do three of four things at once and keep that up until one of them shows itself to be the winner — but you’re kidding yourself. All you’re doing is shortchanging all three or four projects. You need to choose one. Not two. One.”

I’ve heard about this before in the book The One Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan. (Really on the nose with that title aren’t we, Gary?)

And he’s right.

There’s only so much you to go around. No matter how much you say or desire to do, there’s only so much time, and energy you can give to each pursuit you have. It’s the classic opportunity cost scenario. The more you give into one thing, the less time you have to give into another.

What Brandon and Gary are telling us is that it’s not that we can’t or shouldn’t do multiple things, it’s that without other resources to help counterbalance the time need to do something right, we’re going to end up doing something less than our best.

The only analogy I can think of at the moment is juggling. When you’re juggling 4 or 5 different objects, you’re really only touching one at a time and passing it on. You’re focusing on one object at hand while being situationally aware of everything else in front of you. And when you have the financial capability to delegate someone else’s time and energy to the mission, you can give your full attention to more things. Two jugglers, four hands.

Goals can be compatible with one another, but they also have to compatible with what you have to offer (time, energy and money)

The biggest problem I’ve been butting up against this past year is money. With multiple disciplines and goals, I only have so much capital to go around. Am I going to purchase a new amp and equipment for my guitar, or am I going to buy a new mixer for podcasting? I want both but I would need to increase my finances for that to happen or save over time (which requires more time and energy put into my business).

You can see the benefit of focusing on one thing, and how multi-disciplines can get hairy quickly. (Like a great time travel movie)

And here lies Brandon’s conclusion:

“If I had to pick a single core principle for success in business, it would be this: choose one thing, focus on that one thing, and execute it to the absolute limit of your abilities. Focus on your career, invest in yourself, and learn how to say no to everything else.” 

“Once you reach the point where you have the financial capacity to hire out or partner with the talent and team power to manage a range of different areas, you can start adding additional projects to your portfolio… maybe.“

If you want to have a Renaissance Life, be a Master of multiple disciplines and an extraordinary life, start with one thing. Focus in one area that is meaningful to you. Give it all of your attention until you master it. Once you do that, expand your circle with an additional focus, rinse and repeat.

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner

iPhone X

I decided to go for an X this year.

Unfortunately, everything I had read up to that decision said the phone was going to be in short supply.

Pre-orders would start at 12:01 am Pacific time. And since I am on the east coast pre-orders started at 3 am. (Gross)

I stayed up waaaay later than I normally do (grandpa needs his sleep), but I eventually fell asleep with my alarm set to 2:55 am

I got up in a complete daze at 2:59.
I grabbed my laptop and pulled up apple.com and att.com

AT&T did a cool thing and had a waiting list this year (unless you were one of the unfortunate souls who was stuck in AT&T limbo). 

I was locked in 17th person in line, estimated wait time until order: 18 minutes.

I jumped tabs to Apple, everything was smooth sailing, it even looked like I was going to get the phone on release date, but my brain wasn’t working. 

In my hazy state, for some reason, I saw the shipping address as my old address instead of my current address.  And they wouldn’t let me change it because it was set to my AT&T billing address! (Which I couldn’t change because I was still locked in the waiting list at AT&T)

I didn’t have the brain power to comprehend. I just sat there. I watched the delivery date slip from Nov 3rd to a couple weeks, to November 20th to Dec… 😱 My brain finally started booting. I realized, that shipping address is correct! ‘Wait… It’s set to the right address! Idiot!’ (Like I had some sort of time dyslexia)

Eventually, I just took a chance and waited on the AT&T line, got in after the 18(ish) minutes were up and ordered my X. Should be here on the 3rd.

Total time: 1hour at 3 am 😴

I’m a very tired camper, and this is a very first world problem.

 

‘I Can Do That’

Do you ever catch yourself thinking, “I can do that” when you see greatness on display?

(Write a book? I could totally do that… NFL? Psh move over Manning..)

I’ll make jokes about it sometimes, but other times I’m serious. I desire what they have. I want to be that good at writing, speaking, singing or whatever it may be.

That idea got me thinking.

What’s the difference between someone saying I can do that, versus someone saying it and doing it?

 

walking the walk  

Developing strategies of self-awareness will help guide you down the road you truly want to go, instead of the one you think you want to go.

The first thing we need to do is ask ourselves, “Is this right for me?”

“Is this right for me?”

Is this something I really want and value for myself and those around me? Or is this simply jealousy or flight of fancy?

The second thing to be aware of is compatibility. “Is this right for me right now?”

Does this goal work with my life? Does this goal align with my other goals and the goals of those closest to me?

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“Is this right for me right now?”

Once you know you’re in it to win it, there are three tips I can think of to push you into action:

  1. Having some idea of what your getting into
  2. Knowing where you’ll end up if you stick with it
  3. Leaping into it immediately.

There’s always going to be a beginner mode (aka suck fest) where you be laughably bad at it. (Whatever *it* is for you)

By getting real with yourself and acknowledging that, you won’t see the flaws when you fail, you’ll see ways you can improve.

And if you know what consistency will lead to — how your life will change if you compared to where you are if you actually do this — you will see the value in taking action. Your mind and what you need to do will be clear. 

With a sound perspective on your start and the possibilities of the finish, you are ready.

All that’s left is stepping out into the fear. The longer you wait the harder it will be and the more likely you’ll hold it off indefinitely. Leap.

When you decide to do something, take an immediate step towards your dream. 

After that, it’s all about belief. ‘Believe that you can and you’re halfway there.’

No one stumbles upon greatness.

Point me to anyone who has achieved what they desire without having belief in themselves that they could make it happen. No — that they will make it happen.

Believe in yourself josh d 🐞mn it.

Inspiration:
Ryan Holiday: 2007 SEPT. https://ryanholiday.net/ryanholiday-net/

“I can do that.” … I bet there are at least a thousand other people that felt the same way. I have seen their applications. But I went out and did it. Almost everything I have done in the last 4 years was in some way connected to making that a reality. It wasn’t “I can do that now” or “I deserve that today” but that it was within my range. And so I made it happen.

Birthday Resolutions (Gold Star Goals)

Happy New Year

Yesterday was my 27th birthday.
(If life was Game of Thrones, it would have been my 27th Name Day)

For the past few years, I like to make my yearly goals on my birthday instead of the new year.

27 goals for my 27th year. (You’re crazy josh — you bet your 🌜ss I am)

Reflecting on What Was

2015 and 2016 were the best-worst years of my life. I feel like I hit rock bottom in more ways than one. (Finances, Health, Relationships, Energy.. I will be writing in-depth stories about these.) And as stupid as it sounds, I wouldn’t change a thing. (I know I said this in a previous post, as I’m reflecting on my past year, I think it’s good to reiterate important turning points in your life.)

My setbacks have realigned me to my mission of a Renaissance Life. (aka eat more chocolate) They’ve also given me the gift of humility, and the forethought of knowing what’s really important to me or not. (chocolate ✔️; everything else.. ?)

In 2015, the world was telling me no, and that came to it’s crescendo in early 2016.

Conscious or not, right then and there I decided to say yes to every opportunity that came my way. And I am not disappointed by that choice.

When the world says No, It’s Time to say Yes +

 

Deciding on What Is

In 2017 will be the year of experience. I am going to try new things (different kinds of chocolate?), get into my discomfort zone, make BOLD Moves and experiment my way towards my goals.

Tangent: I am going to leave room for my goals to flex and change. (This hits one of the larger issues with New Year’s Resolutions by the way. We have this fixed ideas of who we want to be, but real life is not fixed. One goal today, could be irrelevant tomorrow. The key is knowing the underlying theme’s of what matters to you.) I want to challenge myself and see what I’m capable of, see what I can become.

I’m also not kidding myself in thinking I can do all of this at once (it’s not going to happen). Try and do everything and you eventually overwhelm yourself into doing nothing. 

This year, I’m going back to elementary school (baby)! Each goal has a gold star value. Each goal will have a certain weight of stars behind it. The name of the game is to get as many stars as possible this year. I’m creating a large vision board with all my goals that I can stick stars on as I earn them. I’m making this up on the fly, so I’ll be updating the goal star system as I go. (work in progress)

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27 at 27

Here are my 27 goals in no particular order:

1. I will push my physical fears to the limit

  • I will go hang-gliding (1 Star)
  • I will skydive (3 Stars)
  • I will run with my shirt off around town (5+ Stars)

2. I will interview 1000 creative people this year for my podcasts and for RenaissanceLife.com

  • ( 1 Star per interview) (5+ each 25 interviews)

3. I will travel outside of the country. (3 Stars)

  • 1 Star for every micro-adventure.

4. I will cultivate and cherish 25 excellent friendships.

  • 5 Star for first date, 1 Star for following dates (Stars are doubled with weekly follow throughs / consistency).

5. I will Increase my income to 10,000 month (10 Stars)

6. I will take an Improv class (7 Stars)

7. I will Watch 1 TED Talk every day this year. (1 star per 5 days in a row)

8. Read Review and speak my goals aloud every day (1 Star each day)

  •  Gratitude Practice every day
  •  Affirmation Practice every day
  •  Visualization Practice every day 

9. I Will Perform Music on stage

  • 5 Stars for the first
  • 1 Star per performance
  • 3 Star every 5 Performance

10. I Will Release a Music EP (10 Stars)

11.  I Will Write the first draft of my fiction book: Reflections (The Mirror Saga Book) (10 Stars)
12.  I Will Write and ship an ebook: Be Your Own Renaissance (10 Stars)
 

13.  I Will Make My Businesses Thrive:

  • I will make boldsheep into a successful crafting company
  • I will help grow Pass It Down to incredible heights
  • I will help grow PaulCummings.com into an even greater influential brand

14. I Will Binge Read 8 Blogs (Ryan Holiday, Seth Godin, Tim Ferriss, Brain Pickings, James Altucher, Ramit Sethi, Pat Flynn, and Bill Gates)

  • 10 Stars for Completely Reading them
  • 1 Star per idea / blog / action inspired by readings
  • Another star for doing the action yourself 

15. I Will Master the Strategies of Finances

  • Write and keep a track of finances every day (1 Star / 5 consecutive days)
  • Invest (3 Stars x)
  • Save (3 Stars x)
  • Spend time learning finances (1 Star per hour)
  • Spend time learning about bitcoin (1 Star per hour)

16. I Will Dance with Gabriella (1 Star each time)

17. I Will Go to Relationship Counseling with Gabriella (1 each time)

  • Find Relationship Mentors (10 Stars )

18. I will Get FIT

  • +5 lbs of Muscle (5 Stars)
  • Flexible AF (5 Stars)

19. I will Read, Review and take Action on 100 books. (1 Star per review)

  • Quality over Quantity
  • Action over Speaking
  • Practice what you Read  

What does taking action on a book look like? (1 Star per Action Taken)

Examples:

  • Reflection Questions
  •  Action Steps
  • Book Influences
  • People to Reach out to for Interviews / Conversations.

20. I will build a Podcasting Empire (1 Star every podcast session shipped)

  • (2 Stars per every consecutive week)

21. I will Blog every day (1 Star every consecutive day)

22. I will Design every day (1 Star every consecutive day)

23. I will Sketch every day (1 Star every consecutive day)

24. I will have fun and say yes to new experiences (1 Star per experience)

Examples:

  • Learn Tai Chi

25. Secret 1
26. Secret 2
27. Secret 3

 

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner

Q: What goals are you pursuing right now? 

 

Becoming a Thought Leader

Have you noticed the butt-load of people out there trying to build their personal brand without actually living what they’re saying?

I don’t think it’s possible to be great influencer without doing what you are preaching. (I’m telling myself this more than anyone else)

Are you trying to be your own version of GaryVee? How about Seth Godin, Sophia Amoruso, or Tim Ferriss?

Well, then you better d🙉mn well be creating your own business and doing the work.            

Love or hate his in-your-face personality, GaryVee’s created a $100+ million dollar agency. And that speaks volume. In fact, he’s said so himself — his highly successful personal brand is his side-business.

Without the practice behind the preaching, it’s all icing and no cake. (The first bite is amazing but immediately downhill from there)

I can self-help you all day, but if my strategies don’t work for my own life, how could I possibly think they would work for yours?
Arrogance is not confidence.

How can we teach business without having a successful business of our own? (Or even a failed business of lessons learned?)

How can we teach anything without the experience to back it up?

If you want to be a thought leader like I do, you can’t just say it — you’ve got to live it.

Q: How are you living it?

Thought leadership requires practicing what you preach.

(And I think you have to have a balance of both practicing and preaching)

I can see three approaches to becoming a thought leader (two good, one bad): 

  1.  Preach what your learning
  2.  Preach what you’ve learned
  3.  Preach what you’ve heard.

The first two require incredible amounts of energy and thought, but are well worth it by the amount of influence, connections, and success you will create.

The last might get you a following, but it won’t be real. Your following will only consist of other shhmoe’s trying to do the same thing. (#followforfollow)

I don’t label myself as a Renaissance Man, instead, I see my mission as becoming a Renaissance Man — there’s a big difference.

One says I’m there. I’ve made it. I’ve got nothing left to learn. (closed-minded and destined for mediocrity.)

The other says this is a lifelong journey. It’s not about becoming the dream, it’s living towards the dream.

Remember: If you want to be a thought leader, go out there and live.

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner

 

Influence

“An ounce of practice is worth more than tons of preaching”

— Gandhi

“
We’re so engaged in doing things to achieve purposes of outer value that we forget the inner value, the rapture that is associated with being alive, is what it is all about.”

— Joseph Campbell

Giving Into Easy

I go through dips in my life where I just want to give up. (Why am I doing this? How could I possibly think I — of all people — can make a difference.) I fall into a haze of self-pity and frustration in myself.

But then I catch myself. (I’m giving into easy again.)

Feelings of frustration and angst are a natural part of pursuing a difficult goal.

It’s easier to give in to watching people talk about growing your business on YouTube than it is to take action on your own business.

It’s easier to get caught up in the news (I need to stay ‘informed’ because I said so) than it is to go for a walk or have deep conversations with loved ones.

It’s easier to stick with the status quo than to challenge your comfort zone and get into your discomfort zone.

It’s easier to be in the crowd than it is to be on stage.

It’s easier to let things slide than to keep them together.

It’s easier to say nothing, do nothing, and be nothing than be something.

Easy will always be an option we can make at any crossroads.

There will always be easier things we can do, and even more, easier things to do after that, but easy won’t change your life or get you where you want to go.

Never Give Into Easy.

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Easy isn’t going to make your dreams happen.

Easy isn’t going to change you.

Easy isn’t going to make your life extraordinary.

Extraordinary takes effort. (which sounds like hard work.. because it is — and it’s worth it)

Never give in to easy, when your mind, body and spirt whispers easy, stop and do the opposite.

Do The Opposite.

Work hard. Make decision. Learn from failures. Ask. Apologize. Do something.

Something is always better than nothing.

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner 

Gunpoint

I think I was just held up at gunpoint.

(Wait. What did you just say?)

I was doing my morning walk, had my headphones on with The James Altucher Show playing, and a beat up car creeps up to me.

I didn’t hear them at first, and when I did I was thinking to myself, ‘ok, pass me car’. I was really engrossed in Jim Kwik’s story about speed reading.

But the car kept hovering near me.

 Then I heard “give me your headphones and phone.”

“What?” I said. “Just take those headphones and phone and put them in the car.”

….

I looked at the driver, then and his front passenger. Looked at his left hand, he was holding something at his side in an unnatural way. I glanced into the back, a lady was apologizing and sympathizing. The car smelled of smoke and grime.

I looked back to the driver and said,

“No.”

The lady kept apologizing, I kept looking at them, and then they just drove off.

Your life is worth more than a pair of headphones and an iPhone, but after the year I’ve had — setback after setback, pain, health problems, frustrations, financial problems, and more — I guess nothing phases me anymore.

My instincts are crazy.

More on my setbacks and how to turn your worst circumstances into your greatest opportunities soon.

 

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner

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Relentless Pursuit

So much can happen in two months.

It’s hard to wrap my head around it all.

I haven’t posted a blog in a while. I’ve still been writing and interviewing but haven’t created the time to actually do all the little things required to ship it out to the world.

Editing, uploading, linking, photography, posting, social media, connecting.. rinse repeat.

I’ve got the creativity down but not the managing.

I need to learn how to better manage myself and my time effectively so the little things don’t add up to big things.

Now I could stand here and explain (*cough* complain *cough*) why I haven’t made the time for the small things.

Setbacks — My life’s been in turmoil this year with finances, friends, health..

Opportunity — My time and energy are elsewhere with new Pursuits — I got a new full-time job at Pass It Down as the Creative Director. I got a second full-time job as Paul Cummings Online Business Hacker.. (Yes, I am crazy)

But honestly, I wouldn’t change a thing. Setbacks happen, and what we do with forges us into who we are. Opportunities are in arms reach when we say yes more. Knowing how you can apply setbacks and opportunity to what’s important to you is the hard part.

Writing is too important for me to take shortcuts or do anything but take the little things seriously.

You could make the case that the little things in life are the most important things.

The Little Things ARE the Big Things.

Our daily actions add up to our dreams becoming reality. Each day we invest in.. something (whether we realize it about it or not). What are you investing in? The little things act like compound interest. They habitualize. (I love making up words.) They build and build until one day they become BIG.

Q: What important things are you neglecting right now?

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In the next coming months, I’m going to focus on mastering the Micro-Skills involved in writing, blogging, and podcasting.

Creating doesn’t magically equal success because creating is only a small piece of the work.

You have to have ridiculously good content first, (otherwise, why would anyone want to consume your work?) but you also have to be great at all the skills that surround the pursuit that you love. (Or great at outsourcing what you’re not good at)
 
Writing, Music, Learning, and Connecting are important to me.

When you have something that’s important to you, you can’t just let it slide by. (You can, but that’s the path of most regret)

Do you want to be someone who looks back at a shoulda-coulda-woulda life with remorse? Longing for something more than a job you hate, friends you don’t have, and opportunities you didn’t take?

You have to pursue it with all your might — no hesitation.

 

Relentless Pursuit is how we make dreams happen.

 

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner