Linked Local Network

It’s never as easy as you think it should be. All those beliefs and opinions you have that you hold as unchangeable — those are just a few life circumstances away from being changed. By you. On purpose. What you thought was clearly black and white is now shades of gray. I remember one such story vividly: Before I was the businessman that I am now, I spent 3 years in seminary studying New Testament Greek theology. It was an extremely conservative Baptist study of the Bible. One of the hot button topics that was frequently discussed was homosexuality. I was taught, along with hundreds of other students studying theology there, that the LGBT lifestyle was a choice — a deliberate way of living based on perverted sexual preferences. That’s what I was taught. Quite simply, those people were going straight to hell. No chance of redemption whatsoever. At the end of my third year, I was asked not to return to that seminary due to my views — that diffe...

It takes time to turn things around. No matter where you are or what you’re trying to accomplish, the truth about being successful is that it won’t happen overnight. It takes time to create strategy that works for you — time, trial, and error. That’s okay if your life is smooth and you’re making progress each day, but difficult to deal with if you’re in a painful situation. It’s hard to be patient when you’re living through the consequences of bad decisions from your past. Getting to a better place can be all consuming. Don’t lose track of the reality that it is going to take you  time to turn things around. It took time to get you here. It’s going to take more time to get you there. Maybe even the rest of your life. That’s why it is important to manage your daily momentum. It’s not all going to happen quickly. Change isn’t always something that you can see. You have to feel it. Create it. Live it. Use sm...

Some days all the pieces just fall into place. Making deals seems easy. Your conversations are inspired. The pieces of the puzzle fit into place without much of a fight. Those are the days you want every day. Where you are seeing the rainbows and enjoying the sunset. But those days don’t come easily. They are the result of the rest of your days — where nothing seems easy, inspired, or the least bit enjoyable. The days where you’re not really sure it’s worth it. The days where you’re working hard and not seeing any results. The days where smart people tell you what you’re doing isn’t going to be successful. Those are the days you have to endure to get to the moments when everything feels right. When things fall into place. That’s important to remember when you can’t see rainbows and aren’t sure the sun will come up again. Your moment of triumph will come as long as you’re willing to keep working. Disregard the critics. Ign...

There’s always more you can do. There’s always more focus you can bring to managing your priorities. More effort you can bring to getting things done. More money you can invest in realizing your dream. More ways to win. More urgency. More intensity. You have it. It’s inside you. And all around you. You just don’t know how to get to it. Until something bad happens — then you somehow find a way to tap into the extra reserve. You find a way when the stakes are high enough. You get more creative. More inspired. More purposeful. Somehow, against the odds, you get better when things get really, really bad. You don’t give up and fall apart. You find a way through the obstacles standing in your way. The bigger the challenge, the better you get at figuring it out. But that only happens a few times in your life. Most of the time you just let life take you where it wants to go. You make excuses. Blame other people. Whine. Whimper. Wish things were different. All...

Success isn’t a moment in time. It’s a process. It doesn’t matter what you’re trying to achieve — being successful takes focus, planning, and commitment. Along the way to succeeding you’re going to fail. You’re going to fail a lot. You’re going to try to accomplish you goal and come short. It’s not life ending, career ending, or goal ending. Just a part of your evolution from where you are now to where you need to be. It’s why we call it a journey. Not a destination. Which is why your mindset matters. It matters more than anything. How you look at temporary failure is a good indication of how likely you are to be massively successful. Or not. If you’re more concerned about saving face then pushing yourself beyond what is comfortable, you’ll never achieve the level of success that’s possible for you. If you view failure as an opportunity to test yourself against better competition or a chance to learn what area...

That other person that looks successful and is telling you they have all the answers probably can’t help you the way you think they can. They don’t have the answers to your problems. They might have a answer to a problem that they solved for themselves or someone else — but there’s no guarantee that your problem is something that they can fix. It’s important you realize that as soon as possible. Just because you feel more stuck than they appear to be doesn’t mean that you need their help. Or that you can unstick yourself by paying them for their help. That’s the irony of other people’s success. It all looks better in hindsight. Your situation always feels worse than it actually is. What makes your situation truly bad is when you panic and foolishly pay other people to do what only you can do for yourself. It’s going to take some time to fix your situation. It’s not going to be easy, cheap, or pretty. It’s going to take yo...

You can be anything you want to be as long as you are willing to be something different than you are right now. You can’t be better and still do the same mediocre activities that make you good enough right now. You can’t evolve, expand, and take your game to the next level if you’re not willing to dramatically change what you do. You have to change before change happens. Deliberate, uncomfortable change. Not different excuses. Not better reasons. Not new ideas, easier challenges, or trendy schemes. Real change. You have to do the hard things that you’re not doing right now. On a schedule. Each day. Bit by bit by bit. Not all at once. Not one sprint towards the finish line. Continual, obsessive progress. If you want to achieve something you have never had before, you must do something you have never done before. And then keep doing it. Until it works. That’s the secret to living a life without limits. That’s the answer to your struggle to lead bet...