Month: May 2020

Closing Threads

“Singleness of purpose is one of the chief essentials for success in life, no matter what may be one’s aim.”

John D. Rockefeller

Whenever I feel overwhelmed, I have a mental/journaling exercise I do where I imagine if I dropped everything on my todo list.

Every task, obligation, book, responsibility, dream, possession, need—I pretend that I lit a match and set all the boats on fire.

Imagine it—you have nothing required of you and your slate is empty.

After picturing it in my mind I’ll begin to feel a weight lifted off of me. We tend to put so much pressure on ourselves. The pressure to perform, the pressure to succeed, the pressure to win. And when we can’t match all of our expectations we pull on even more weight. And it’s not just the work that creates pressure but the added mental weight of our expectations that really buckle our knees.

In fact, how we think about things adds 100x the power to our actions.

Trying to do too much at once is one thing, attempting to do too much while expecting we can do it all adds 100x the weight to our shoulders.

But when you let all the expectations and mental chatter go you will feel free. The weight is gone.

After mentally removing everything from my calendar, I then ask myself two important questions:

What do I actually want to do? (Or put another way, what am I willing to carry?)

And, out of all of my needs and responsibilities, what’s one thing I can focus my efforts on RIGHT NOW that would make me feel better (not overwhelmed) and accomplished?

Overwhelm is solved by not saying yes to everything (especially if you actually want to say no) and by prioritizing and focusing all your efforts on one task and one task only. Yes, your todo list might be a mile long, but that doesn’t matter right now—all that matters is the task at hand.

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #944

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Deep Dive

“Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

I wouldn’t be who I am if it weren’t for good books and other work from smart and creative people out there in the world (and from the past). It’s been said time and again that you are the sum of the people you surround yourself with the most. It’s also true that you are the sum of what you read, watch, listen to, and experience.

It’s truly inspiring—and a little frightening when you think about it—how one book, or one podcast, or one video can change your life. There is (and has been) a lot of chaos in the world, but there’s also a huge amount of people doing incredible and impactful work. We can be that too (perhaps you already are) if we take up the call. It doesn’t have to be big. Small changes and details are often what makes the most impact. But it does require us to seek it out and initiate it.

But first, we have to be willing to see our own faults and change ourselves.

Which leads us back to good inputs.

If you want to be an influencer, you have to first learn to be influenced by people doing great things.

We must dive deep. Whatever it is you want to be good at it. We must go beyond the latest best sellers or hot trends and find the principles that guide creativity and community.

We need to study the greats—people much wiser and smarter than ourselves.

We need to learn how to think, truly think for ourselves, versus repeating what we hear and learn.

We need to learn the fundamentals of the universe—philosophy, math, music, physics, statistics, nature—and find interesting ways to combine them.

And we need to seek out deep conversations and friendships. Liking someone’s photo is nice, but reaching out and making friends is impactful both ways.

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #943

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Keeping Your Word

“All you have in business is your reputation – so it’s very important that you keep your word.”

Richard Branson

Over-promise, underdeliver—it’s easy to do in our fast past world. The almost funny thing (the kind of funny that makes you want to cry too) is that the majority of people that over-promise and underwhelm are one who genuinely wants to do good work and make an impact, but in so doing lean too far forward and say yes to too many things or exaggerate their abilities.

Perhaps it’s because, deep down, we all want to be someone— somebody who matters. And because of that we rush forward before we are ready and make a decision before we think them through.

But rushing never brings you the quality of results you are looking for.

It takes time to hone your skills. It takes experience to earn success. It takes hard work to make your move. There are ways we can improve faster and more effectively, but it takes consistency and dedication to bring value to the world around you.

At the end of the day, what do we have but our word and the actions tied to them?

Deliver when you can, apologize and make it right when you can’t. Otherwise, you’ll dilute your power to help others (and yourself for that matter).

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #942

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Limiting Beliefs / Limitless Beliefs

“Expect great things, and great things will come.”

Norman Vincent Peale

“Yeah, I’m late to everything LOLs…”

That’s me. I’ve said a version of the phrase above more times than I can remember. In high school, I was late to first class so much that we (our class) started collecting my tardy slips and taping them to the wall as a joke—like a badge of honor (shame? disbelief? 🙂 to see how many I accumulated.

I try not to be late nowadays—at least when it matters. You get to a point where you realize it’s a sign of respect when you get somewhere on time because you are respecting someone else’s time. I have to fight it because as a multi-disciplinary, I have a tendency to take on too much during the day. (A topic for another day, perhaps.)

Another phrase I’ve said a lot:

“I’m terrible with direction.”

This one you still my catch me saying. I’ve learned a lot—directions aren’t one of them. It’s not that I can’t find my way around—I can tell you which direction is east and which is west—rather, I’m generalizing. The truth is I don’t bother memorizing road names or direction details. I can easily get around if I’ve been to a place before, otherwise, I couldn’t tell ya where were are or give you directions without whipping out my phone and asking my friend GPS.

There’s a huge part of our identity that’s wrapped in negative labels we adopt from others or give to ourselves.

Perhaps you weren’t aware of it until now, but once you know it, you’ll start to hear it from everyone.

“Oh yeah, I suck at math!”

“Yoga?! I’m as stiff as a board. You won’t see me bending like that”

“Cooking? You mean takeout?”

“I’m so unlucky!”

“I”m terrible at finances lol.”

It goes on and on. We wear these labels like a badge of honor, but in reality, we are just holding ourselves back from being a better version of ourselves.

The reason I’m usually bad with directions because I don’t prioritize learning it. In fact, my mindset is an action AND reaction that devalues me from wanting to be good at it.

The same goes for other negative traits we feel about ourselves.

Something bad happens—like we spill coffee on our brand new white pants—and then we mentally tell, no convince, ourselves we are unlucky. At that point, two things occur 1. We become aware of our “unluckiness”. We start seeing out validating reasons why we are unlucky to prove to ourselves we are right. And 2. we view the world through our “unlucky” mindset and start making decisions that lead us to be more unlucky.

The interesting thing is the reverse can happen too—we can convince ourselves that we are the luckiest person in the world—and find ways to validate it and we start taking action that makes it true.

In a word—we are all biased by our “badges of honor”, so to speak.

The real question is who do you want to be? What kind of person do you want to be?

By thinking through the limiting believe’s you have, you can slowly begin to convert them to limitless beliefs instead.

What do you believe about yourself that isn’t doing you any favors? What can you replace them with?

What do you believe about yourself that you want to be true? What can you start doing to make that happen?

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #941

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What’s Your Motivating Factor?

“Ever since I was a child I have had this instinctive urge for expansion and growth. To me, the function and duty of a quality human being is the sincere and honest development of one’s potential.”

Bruce Lee

Motivation can come from a lot of places. Pain, for example, is a great motivating monkey wrench. I wouldn’t wish pain on anyone, but it can be an annoying nagging friend that puts a spotlight on something out of alignment with your life.

Growing up, we think we are invincible. But if you are the parent in this equation, you know that your child is anything BUT invincible (—Try telling that to them though). It’s not until they skid their knees falling off a bike, break an arm rollerskating, or get emotionally bullied at school when they realize that pain is real as anything else.

This isn’t necessarily always a bad thing if it inspires/motivates you allow it to lift you up and make you better and forge a different path that you wouldn’t have otherwise taken. There’s nothing like a taste of death—like a heart attack or a bout with cancer, or chronic issue—that can motivate you to be more intentional and your health and how you live. Is this easy? No. But it is insightful.

Curiosity is another excellent motivator. The drive to seek answers beyond the surface of things, and unlock the secrets of the universe can motivate you to wake up and get going with enthusiasm each day. There is energy and agelessness in the joy of finding out how things work and why.

Some motivations happen to us—like pain, shame, circumstances, etc—and some motivations we can choose to cultivate—like curiosity, resiliency, success. One key aspect of a good life is to not let the bad motivations keep us down and instead allow them to teach us an uncomfortable lesson we can use and pass on to others through our story.

Questions: What’s motivating you? Is it a positive motivation (something that gives you energy vs. drains you?)

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #940

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Intentional Joy

“The three great essentials to achieve anything worth while are: Hard work, Stick-to-itiveness, and Common sense.”

Thomas A. Edison

It’s late. I’m extremely tired, but the good kind of tired that you feel after a hard day of working with your hands. 

From what, you ask, dear reader? Painting a room. Which, might not seem like much, but you would be mistaken. First you have to move everything out of the space, then use tape around anything you don’t want to have paint on it. Next you prime the walls, edge the trim, and another coat of paint to trim and then roller out two layers of paint over the walls. In our case, it was more difficult because we were going from a dark navy color to light green, so it took much longer to cover up. 

I’ve never been particularly fond of painting rooms. I love painting ideas on canvas, but painting rooms can suck it. 

But like most things in life, it depends on how you do it, and who you do it with. (In my case I spent the day painting with Gabriella, so despite not enjoying the work, I enjoyed the company. 🙂

Any task can be accomplished in dozens or more of ways, but not all of them bring the same amount of joy. What we bring to the table matters immensely on the outcome of the work.

Take any given task—mowing the lawn, data entry, customer service, house-cleaning, etc—and you’ll find someone out there that will complain all week about having to do it, but you’ll also find someone who loves doing it.

The same goes for any task we do. You could hate your job, love your job, or be somewhere in between, and that mindset alone will determine how well you do, how much you value your time, and how happy you are because of doing it.

I can dislike painting rooms and still find joy out of it. If I can’t find joy from the task itself, then there’s likely another layer or two—like a good podcast, great music, fun conversations—that I can add on top of the task to add joy to an otherwise boring labor-intensive task.

There are exceptions too, I think.

I would be miserable mowing lawns because I’m allergic to grass. That’s something I need to say no to and give it / pay for someone else to do it. There’s joy in that too.

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #939

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After ‘em

You can’t win the lottery if you don’t play.

Not that I’m recommending you to buy lottery tickets (the odds are stacked against you).

But there are plenty of “games” we give up before even trying. You can’t win if you don’t try.

Sometimes refusing to play is playing by a different game. But when it comes to ambitious dreams, they won’t happen unless you get up every day and go after them.

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #938

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What’s Holding Us Back?

We suffer more by what we want and don’t have, compared to what misfortune we may have to deal with.

Loss, injury, burden, negatively, broke, empty, these are all painful things that bring unhappy emotions.

But nothing drives unhappiness more than dwelling on things you don’t have.

Sometimes that can drive us to achieve and get those things at all costs.

But recognizing that gives us the opportunity to create a better path with better motivations. We can both achieve and enjoy the moment of where we are. It takes practice, but it’s doable. It’s taking your story and seeing it in a different light. A journey of hope and overcoming what’s holding us back—ourselves.

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #937

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Bad Habits x 2

“Your net worth to the world is usually determined by what remains after your bad habits are subtracted from your good ones.”

Benjamin Franklin

Bad habits define us as much (if not more than) our good habits.

They also double-dip: we get the downsides of doing them plus the negative effect of not doing the good alternatives instead.

For example, eating junky food not only has the downsides of upping your sweatpants from a large to a double xl, it also reduces your energy and abilities by not giving you the nutrients you need. The downsides of the bad and the lack of upsides from the good.

Same goods for all habits. A good habit provides benefits that lead to more opportunities for benefits—a bad habit produces side effects while taking away the benefits you would have received from doing the better opposite.

This can stack up in all sorts of unfortunate or fortunate ways.

This is the underlying pattern of why having money gives you more opportunities to create more money. And why your environment and the people you surround yourself with is so important to your overall wellbeing and success.

The key is replacing all of your bad habits with good ones before your bad habits take your lunch AND eat it too.

Make a list of all your habits. Big, small, conscious, subconscious—whatever you can think of.

Then, mark the ones you think are negatively impacting you. It’s okay if you aren’t one hundred percent sure.

Start with a win. What’s a low hanging fruit you can easily pick and feel good about?

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #936

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You Are What You Want to Be

“What I have is a malevolent curiosity. That’s what drives my need to write and what probably leads me to look at things a little askew. I do tend to take a different perspective from most people.”

David Bowie

What makes you you?

Is it your likes and dislikes? Is it your culture or your heritage? Is it where you go to school or what you do for a living? What about your taste in podcasts or your ironic mug collection? Is it your fashion style (or lack thereof)? 

There’s a lot that goes into making a person. Sure, you’ve got your blood, muscles, and bones, but there’s a lot that we naturally absorb as we live our lives. We absorb what’s around us and either accept, ignore, or reject everything in millions of ways. 

Music plays a large part in our foundational makeup. We identify who we are by the music we are interested in. Lack of music defines us too. Every so often I’ll run into someone who doesn’t like music, or at the very least doesn’t listen to it. To me, this is baffling (This emoji sums my reaction up nicely: 😧) — how can someone not like music?! But it’s true, and that’s a piece of what makes them who they are. 

I wouldn’t say that I grew up in a musical household per-sé. My first concert was likely a Christian pop or rock band like the Newsboys or Audio Adrenaline… I definitely got my taste in the 60s, 70s music from my parents. Creedence, Thin Lizzy, The Bee Gees, and AC/DC — from my dad. Prince, Tears for Fears, The Beatles, Michael… — from my mom.

Friends and other people I looked up are a huge influence on my taste in music. One key influence was from my friend Jake Lemons. (Hey Jake 👋) Being a killer guitarist, he’s the one who lit the spark for my interest in learning to play music (him and my grandfather). He’s also the one that helped me find Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd, and Ozzy — the kind of people who take music to a whole new level. (Def Leppard: Pour Some Sugar On Me — Jimi Hendrix: “…Hold my beer”)

It’s funny how a single person, a small moment, or a passing conversation can have a massive impact on your trajectory in life.

A spark is the best analogy I can think of at the moment. Influences are like little threads that lead us down a path towards who we are. One second we are seeing in low-resolution standard definition, and the next second we are seeing in 1080p. We’re not quite at 8k HDR yet, but if we keep searching we’ll get there before we know it. 

And at the heart of it all— music tastes, personality, dreams, etc— is discovery. I discovered who I was by taking an interest in things. 

Or put another way —

You are what you want to be.

Curiosity makes us who we are. *Deciding* to do, like, or be a certain person makes us who we are. Allowing ourselves to be influenced by the people around us makes us who we are. Most of the time this isn’t a conscious decision we make. Rather, something we just do and notice (or not) afterward. Oh, wow. It looks like I just ate the weight of a triceratops in ice cream — again.

Invisible scripts run a lot of our lives. But not if we decide to do something about it. If there’s something you don’t like about yourself, or how your life looks, you can change it. Depending on what it is, it might not be easy — but it’s possible. You have the power to own your life. And it starts with seeking it out.

STAY BOLD, Keep Pursuing,
— Josh Waggoner | Daily Blog #935

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