FRIEND,
Before I write anything else, let me start with a fact. I love all of you guys. If I don’t accomplish anything else for the rest of my life, but deepen the relationship I have with each of you, I will have won. With that said, let’s have a real conversation.
We’re at the dawn of the new decade that feels, to me, like a new era. In many arenas, advances are happening at a faster pace causing life to quicken. I think we’ve all experienced this. No matter how many times I do the math, It still blows my mind that I graduated college almost 20 years ago. It doesn’t make sense.
In many ways, I welcome this faster pace and look forward to what the future holds. But before we’re all swept away on the wings of technology and another 20 years pass, I think it’s important to remember that we hold the power to decide which direction we’re headed and reorient ourselves towards our BIG FUCKING DREAMS.
In the history of mankind, there has never been an era like the one we’re currently in, where we’ve enjoyed a freedom of choice along with the technological tools to support almost anything we want to build. If the right tech doesn’t exist, other tools are available to build it. There are really no excuses to not live a fun, exhilarating, and fulfilled life if that’s what you want to do. Note that I did not mention money, although I fully realize money is the fuel that drives the game that we all play. Point is, no matter how incremental or transformational your dreams are, you all know what it takes to get there. The real question is whether or not you’re willing to be disciplined and do the work. It’s not hard to understand. It is hard, I know, to fight distraction even though we realize that that prevents you from going to where you want to be. We all settle at the level we really want. The question that I’m asking you to ask yourselves is, “Are you where you want to be?”
Let me start from a somewhat theoretical place by saying the following: For all of eternity, the laws of the universe will reign supreme. Man is nothing, but a spec of sand on the beach of time as are his laws, customs, rules, etc. We would do well to abide by these man made laws only to the extent they align with universal truths. This alignment allows us to avoid pain and tap into powers far greater than our own. When in sync with these universal truths, great things can be accomplished with less effort. I want to mention two such truths, that if followed, I believe would allow everyone here to accomplish almost anything.
The universal law of honesty. To start, being honest with yourself, while not easy, will free you. Yes, you’re not perfect and that’s ok. Nothing in nature is perfect. In fact, the imperfection is what makes it so beautiful. Nature doesn’t pretend, preferring to simply live in harmony with itself. So first and foremost, be who you are, seek out harmony between your mental, physical, and spiritual states, and strengthen yourself to the extent that you want to. It doesn’t make sense to consistently say one thing and do another - and then beat yourself up about it. If you want to improve, enjoy doing the work and seeing any progress you make, no matter how slow. I do believe that giving an honest effort helps things come into alignment.
The universal law of cooperation: While this law is often neglected, it remains extremely powerful nonetheless. Just as our bodies are made up of individual particles that coalesce to form an intelligent machine, so can we accomplish great feats when acting in harmony with one another. Cooperation is the secret accelerant to great accomplishment, happiness, and fulfillment. You see this concept repeated over and over in our observed world in sports, architecture, business, etc. Selflessly working together towards a greater goal creates a sum that is greater than the individual parts. As a species, many of us are focused on our own economic interest at the expense of others, when in actuality, the world is not zero sum. With this understanding along with the realization that we can all win, EVEN within a capitalism, imagine the possibilities. Being selfless is ultimately selfish in that it offers many more benefits to the person who possesses that mindset than I can list here. It is a competitive advantage that I’m just starting to uncover the full depth of and can prove beneficial across the FULL gamut of your relationships. Let me offer an example. If I had 5 trusted friends and collectively our objectives were two-fold: 1. To keep each other honest and growing and 2. To use our expertise, network, and experience so that we all became billionaires. First, this is the theoretical definition of a “company” and second, there’s NO DOUBT in my mind that we would accomplish something spectacular. Even if we never reached the original goal, we’d accomplish more together than we could ever accomplish alone. We’d be struggling together, and we’d have a blast doing it alongside our closest friends. The alternative would be to go it alone, not have as much fun, and more distant from those we’d ideally like to be closer to. Please debate the merits of these arguments with me.
As I stated at the start, I love you guys. Instead of living these separate lives, I’d love for us to deepen our friendships and accomplish more together. All I need you to do is let the collective group know how we can help you achieve your dreams or incremental goals and allow the collective group to keep you honest as you pursue them. The only commitment we all need to make is that we’ll GO EXTREMELY HARD FOR ONE ANOTHER and then let’s see what happens.
Regardless of whether you want to do this or not, I’m here to help you along your journey however I can. I don’t know shit, but I do know that our collective power is greater than any of us individually. I also know that I get energy from helping the people I care about most. If you’re of the same mindset and want a chance to start a new decade with a commitment to be a better friend, let’s fucking go.
I’m all in.
