I feel like I’ve grown more this year than I have in the last ten. I’ve written about many topics, read a few books, and feel like I’ve gotten to know myself a bit better. Maybe you’ve gotten to know me better, as well.
This time last year, I set out to write weekly for a whole year. 52 weeks of struggling to create content, provide value, and make it actually readable. 52 weeks of being vulnerable, mulling over topics, and proofreading. 52 weeks of grasping, rewriting multiple times, and pulling my hair out.
I did it.
This one-year exercise has forced me to reflect hard on what I’ve learned up to this point in my life, share my thoughts on a platform that will hopefully outlast me, and complete a goal I’ve set out to accomplish at the beginning of the year.
I look forward to next year with great excitement, a rotating mix of laser focus and desperation, and a little luck. Okay, maybe a lot of luck.
Last week, I announced that I will be holding off on FYF to focus on my financial and emotional health. Drastic moves must be made this year. Different jobs. Perhaps even a different city.
You may also have these feelings of fear, fatigue, stress, and sadness. Don’t forget these feelings. Embrace it. Use it. Form it into a sharp arrow of focused action and launch these pre-loaded stressors from a crossbow to hit your target. Visualize it. Feel it. Taste it.
In one week, we will be in the year 2020. We will be in a future that presidential candidate Andrew Yang says will “come to resemble either the cultivated benevolence of Star Trek or the desperate scramble for resources of Mad Max.” We all have a personal responsibility to choose our own future.
I chose Star Trek.
But there will always be things that are more important than chasing the money. At the top of my list is time with friends and family. This year may go by just like the ones before and the ones after, but there are so few that will involve these unique characters, especially as we get older. There are deaths and births. Breakups and relocations. New spouses and significant others with other families they must also spend time with. Not all years will have all members present. Hopefully, during this holiday season, we are able to put the hustle down for a little bit to remember why we are doing it all.
The entrepreneur mindset can be often lonely and tunnel-visioned. The same thing that drives our success can drive us into seclusion. No one can see your silent progress, your silent fear, your hidden drive. While friends and family won’t understand the pains of your journey, attempting to go about it alone isn’t the answer. Ask for help from those that understand.
While the attached costs (financial, emotional, or other) of these social activities can make one avoid these activities altogether, there is wiggle room if you can make some. Make known your limitations on time and cost.
This is not goodbye. This is not farewell.
This is you transitioning with me from being a reader to a doer. This is the beginning of you deciding what is attainable and taking what is yours. This is you building your support network and crushing it with some backup.
People believing in you and you believing is yourself is not enough.
You actually have to go get it.
Like with all of my former students, I have an open-door policy when it comes to future communication. I may be taking a break from these weekly posts, but feel free to drop me a line, a short message, an email or text anytime. FYF will live on through our actions and conversations.
Godspeed.
Fuck yeah, it’s the final Friday of 2019! Bring on 2020!
