Kimanzi Constable's Blog, page 49

I’ll Never Reach My Dream

I’ve been loving every part of Hawaii, this is a really a good place to live a healthy lifestyle. The only problem is you sweat, pretty much all day. To be fair, that could just be me but there’s a lot of walking and bike riding, which brings out the sweat.

Yesterday I went to see a possible home for our family in a little town called Kula. Kula is close to Mount Haleakala, which means the town is on a hill. I took the bus to get there but when the bus dropped me off, I still had a two-mile walk to get to the house.

I saw two miles on Google Maps and thought “no problem, I run ten miles at a time.” As I started going towards the house, I saw the road went uphill. As I kept walking, the hill seemed to never end.

Remember I talked about the sweating? For 30 minutes I’m going up hill, in the sun and started to sweat like crazy. I didn’t want to get to the appointment sweaty and smelly but I still had to walk. I’ll be perfectly honest, at one point I screamed out loud “does this hill ever end?”

I found the house, it was at 3,200 feet above sea level. The whole time climbing I just couldn’t shake the thought that the climb would never end. That’s exactly how it is when you’re chasing a dream.

The rocks on the hill

As you’re chasing that dream, it does feel like climbing up a hill. What’s worse is all the rocks you have to step over on the way up. You’re trying, you’re taking all the right steps but the rocks keep coming!

Understand that this isn’t going to be easy and there are no overnight successes. You have to keep stepping over those rocks and even kick them out-of-the-way. You have to be willing to wake up everyday and hustle.

If you can find it in you to keep pushing up the hill, the reward waiting on the top will seem surreal. I can vouch for that as I’m sitting here right on the beach, hearing the soothing ocean waves. This whole trip and my dream have seemed surreal but it’s not because I’m living it and so can you.

Dig deep to get to the top

To get to the house, I had to dig deep. I focused on where I was going and why, I pushed past the sweat and sore legs and kept going.

Those moments when it seems like nothing is going right, those moments when the doubt tells you that your dream is impossible is when you have to dig deep.

You have a lot more in you than you believe, you can make it through those moments, you can get over those roadblocks and get so much closer to your dream. Find that inner strength and use it to keep pushing you.

Your dreams are totally attainable if you’re willing to put in the work, I hope you are. Was there ever a time when you had to dig deep?

How To Beat Doubt

If I had listened to my doubt, I wouldn’t be sitting here, writing this post from Maui. 

For 12 years I let those doubts keep me from truly living and when I started to take action on my dream, I let doubt keep me from moving forward, faster.

I know many reading this are chasing or living a dream, are you dealing with doubt? I know the answer is yes and that’s why I recorded this short message on a beach here with a few tips for dealing with doubt.

Take it one day at a time, get back up when you fall. A new day is a new opportunity to try again, to start fresh. Don’t let doubt win, life is far to short!

What are your biggest doubts right now? 

5 self-published books, a digital magazine, location independence, productivity: My Interview With Laura Pepper Wu

Greetings from Maui! I got here Tuesday night and have hit the ground running. I’ve seen some possible places to rent, ran 10 miles, biked over 100 miles, and swam 2 miles. Getting some good workout time in

I’ve also kept up with my online business: writing, coaching and contracted some work here locally. It’s surreal to see a three-year dream coming to reality. I’ve really seen that a dream is possible with time and hard work.

Today I got to sit down with my friend Laura Pepper Wu for an amazing interview, there’s some great takeaways in this one. If you’re not familiar with Laura, you should be, especially if you’re doing something in the online space.

Quick back story: after college Laura went to Japan to teach English, she ended up staying longer than she expected and worked for the Embassy in Japan. Met her husband and moved around a bit.

To leave the 9 to 5 grind, over time they wrote and self-published 5 books, the books ended up supporting them and giving them the location independence they desired. They went on to create 30daybooks.com, The Write Life Magazine (a digital magazine for writers, highly recommend it), an app and some book consulting.

In this interview Laura gives us some incredible takeaways, especially if you have a book on Amazon. She talks about online business, location independence and how you can get it all done! If you need helped marketing your book, Laura has a killer SkillShare course you should check out here.  Enjoy:

What did you takeaway from the interview? What can you take action on?

Here’s the picture I was talking about There was a lot more than this!

Greetings From Hawaii, Let’s Hang Out

As you’re reading this, I’m in a plane flying somewhere over the central United States. After three years of dreaming and planning, our families Hawaii dream is becoming a reality.

Many of you have encouraged us and asked about the move, so my plan is to make some short videos throughout the journey, keeping you up to date.

I’ll be on the ground in Maui at 10:30 p.m. (Hawaiian time) depending on the weather, we were hit with a major snow storm last night in Milwaukee.

Look for the videos and if we’re not already connected on Facebook and Twitter, let’s connect!

Let’s hangout out!

It’s been so amazing speaking to so many that read this blog. My number one goal this year is to help you make your dreams a reality.

That’s why I want to have a Google Hangout where we all get together and update each other, get your questions answered and help formulating a solid game plan.

This Hangout will be this Friday (21st) at 8 pm CDT/9 pm EDT. This is all about helping you, hope to see you there! Details here. 

If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?

Get Enough Sleep

“Sleep? Who needs that? I’ll sleep when I’m dead.” I used to tell people this and actually meant it. I delivered bread at midnight every night for 12 years and I had a family, sleep just didn’t fit into the equation.

After the kids activities, church activities, and the hustle and bustle of life, I slept three to four hours a night for most of those twelve years. It had a tremendous effect my on weight, my stress, my mood, almost every area of my life.

As I started to take action on my dream, I knew sleep was going to be an issue. I wasn’t sleeping already, my schedule was crazy busy, when would I find time to work on my dream? I figured for my dream to become a reality, I had to sacrifice another hour of sleep.

It didn’t take long before I crashed and burned, I realized that if my dream was ever going to support me, I needed to be well rested. If you’re going to be successful at your dream or anything in life, you need to get the proper amount of rest.

There are many studies I could give you but common sense tells you I’m right. I’d like to give you a few points that I’ve come to realize about sleep.

Sleep gives you the energy you need

Whether it’s working on your dream on the side or working on your dream after it supports you, both will require a tremendous amount of energy. Getting the proper amount of sleep every night will give you that energy.

After a long hard day, you hit that pillow, sleep for six to eight hours and wake up refreshed. You can then take care of everything the next day with energy versus dragging all day from being tired and cranky.

Sleep helps your body and mind recover

Sleep is the body’s natural way of recovering and getting better. Whether it’s sickness or just getting refreshed, sleep is the answer. Those hours are a great way for your mind to refresh. All the troubles of the day, all those stressful situations, can disappear and your mind can be filled with bliss.

When time is limited and you only have a few hours here and there to work on your dream, don’t sacrifice sleep. I coach people to wake up an hour earlier or go to bed an hour later but that’s only if you’re getting enough sleep.

Everyone is built different and the amount of sleep you need may vary, the best thing you can do is listen to your body. The best way then to work on your dream on the side is to take advantage of anytime you have to work on your dream. We’ll talk about this more in an upcoming post

This is your challenge for the next week, get more sleep! On average, how much sleep do you get a night? What have you learned about sleep and your dream?

Time keeps slipping. How are you spending yours?

This is a guest post by Jason Pockrandt. More about Jason at the end of this post. 

Time: the only resource you can’t replenish. So when you choose to spend it, spend wisely. It can’t be refilled no matter how hard we try or imagine that we can in some way get it back at the end of our lives. I know there are plenty of fathers out there right now reading this and thinking that they spend plenty of time with their children and that life is where they want it. I say, sure.

Maybe it is. Maybe it isn’t 

I know the question has come up before on the topic of work. How much we should work and how much we should spend with our children alongside us following the vision we have created for our lives? I have come to this realization…

I want it all. I want to make the most of the time that I am given with those that matter most to me. 

In the end the time will be gone. It may be sooner than later. You may lose a loved one like a father or move to TN and you won’t have the luxury of a 10 minute drive to mom’s house. Nor the gift to go see Dad down the road.

It will have all been spent. Spent on work, on school, on a job that was blocking you from chasing your dreams and sucking the creativity from your souls. Why? I ask. Why waste your best years doing what doesn’t matter most to you. Working.

Working is great if it’s done in moderation.

Let me clarify something here. I am not opposed to working and having a job that pays the bills, fulfills a value of security and takes you to the next step. I am talking about spending 40 hours a week working or 60 hours at work while your children and your dreams take a back seat in life. Wasting away as we wait for something more. We sit on the sidelines waiting for the next big thing to happen. Hoping one day Jon Acuff will call and invite us to work with him.

News Flash! It doesn’t happen by waiting. 

These things don’t happen by sitting around and waiting. We have to do the work. WE have to hustle. We have to show up through the imperfect blog posts and the scrambled podcast episodes. We must be willing to invest our time into what matters. Sure there is a balancing act that takes place in there quite often.

How do I make dinner, drive the kids to school, and when will I see my wife? If something in life matters you will make time to complete it. Time is slipping from you as we speak. It is waiting for you to go claim it. It is waiting for you to choose. Will you choose your family, your fun, your freedom? Or will you wait for the hourglass to drop it’s final grain of sand on your life and look back from the skies and ask…

Where did I spend my time? Was it alongside the people and places who mattered most to me? My Family, My Fun, and My Freedom. It is my wish for you today that you can answer Yes.

Where are you spending your time today? Are you being active in reaching your vision or do you falsely believe that time can be recycled?

Jason Pockrandt is one of life’s greatest transformations. He is a Speaker and Life Coach who connects young fathers to their true selves by rediscovering who and what matters most: their Families and Freedom. His passion in life is to dig deeper into you, create meaningful relationships and help you transition into a life of Freedom one step at a time. You can subscribe to the Connections Show on iTunes. You can also connect with him on Twitter.  

Three Ways To Get Over Your Fear

In 12 days (February 18, 2013) I leave for Maui, Hawaii, our family is moving to Maui from Milwaukee, WI. This has been our families dream for the last three years.

I’m leaving for phase one of the move, which involves me going alone and finding a place to live for the family. The family comes on April 8th.

As the days get closer, the fear is setting in, to be perfectly honest, I’m scared. While this has been our dream for so long, the thought of actually doing all of this scares the daylights out of me.

Can we find a place at a reasonable price? Where will the kids go to school? Can we really afford it? Like I said, so many fears all screaming louder and louder.

Even though I’m afraid, I’ll still be on that flight in 12 days. After the death of my father, I truly understand what it means to live and not just exist.

If have started chasing a dream this year or have been chasing one for a while, you know all about fear. You think about your dream and everything that it takes to make that dream a reality and it’s easy to get scared.

If you have fear related to your dream, here’s a simple three-part strategy you can use:

Acknowledge your fear

Human nature is to suppress your fear or pretend like it’s not there. The problem with that strategy is that the fear IS there, so acknowledge it.

Be honest with yourself, talk it over with your spouse or a close friend but don’t try to suppress it. Don’t hold those fears inside, verbalize them, it will feel so much better.

Analyze your fear

After those fears are all out in the open and you can clearly see them, analyze them. See if you’re afraid because some part of your plan is off or that your plan is spot on and your fears are the ones that’s off.

Studying your plan is always smart and use those fears to make sure every part of your plan is on track.

Address your fear

So you’ve analyzed your fear and realize everything isn’t as well planned as you wanted, figure out how you can correct things.

When I was coming to the end of my bread career, I realized I hadn’t saved as much money as I wanted to. I still had three months left, so during those three months I worked as much as I could and we didn’t spend money on anything!

Whatever it takes to get your plan back on track, make the sacrifice. Whatever sacrifices you make now will be well worth it in the end. You can do this, you can beat your fear and make your dream your reality this year.

What is one fear that has held you back?

Making The First Sale

Zech Newman has it all, at least that’s how most people would see it. He has a beautiful family, he’s a business owner with two successful pizza restaurants, yet Zech wants more, he wants freedom.

Zech started chasing his dream a few years ago, he started spreading a message. It hasn’t been an easy journey but he’s finally hit a new milestone: he’s made money from something he created.

Zech just released a book and even before the official “launch,” he had a few sales. I know what happens when you finally make money from your dream, I know how that changes your mindset.

I wanted to sit down with Zech and ask him about his journey but more than that, I wanted to hear about that moment when he made money from his dream. In this interview we talk about all of that:

As mentioned in the interview, check out what Zech has going on and if you decide to get his book, email a copy of the receipt to kconstable29@gmail.com and I’ll send you a copy of my guide.

Have you made any money on your dream? How did it feel?

Live Like You Were Dying

I can clearly remember the pain in my right arm, it came out of nowhere, very strange. It was about 7 pm on a Thursday night when I got the call from my grandpa, I remember feeling his sorrow through the phone.

He’s 87-years-old and didn’t expect to out live his son. That Thursday night, my grandfather told me that my father had died. Even as I write those words, a year and a half later, tears are falling on my keyboard.

It’s crazy what you think you know in life. My parents divorced when I was young and the truth is, my father wasn’t in the picture. As I got older and eventually went off on my own, my father tried to establish a relationship with me.

The truth is I was bitter and didn’t let him get close. I thought I was “teaching him a lesson,” in the end, I was the one who learned one of the hardest lessons of my life. After I got that call from my grandfather, I sat there stunned.

I went through the next few days saying thank you to those that sent their condolences but inside I was numb, I didn’t know how to react. The funeral came and it hurt so bad, my arrogance, my need for revenge seem so stupid in the face of death.

He was dead, I couldn’t get back at him, I couldn’t teach him a lesson, I couldn’t forgive him. It was all over, there would be no more second chances. I lost any chance to ever reconcile. That night, it all came out.

I was sitting there, holding this card from the funeral and every once of liquid that I had in my body, came gushing out in tears. I cried for an hour straight, I just couldn’t believe he was gone.

You’ve heard the phrase “life is short,” we’ve heard it so much that it’s almost a clique. You really don’t fully understand what this means until you deal with the death of someone close to you.

What would you do if you were told you only had a certain amount of time to live? How would that change how you lived your life? Would you stay at a job you hated? Would you live a place you didn’t want to live in?

Would you let doubt and fear keep you from the life you truly want? I’m guessing probably not. I’m guessing everything that held you back in the past wouldn’t even be in the forefront of your mind anymore.

I’m guessing that you would treat each MINUTE as if they were the only ones you had left because they would be. No more wasted time, no more distractions, just doing all those things you’ve always wanted to do but let fear keep you from.

We are dying

Here’s something that we “get” but don’t truly understand: we do only have a certain amount of time. None of us will live forever, we all will die someday. When? Only our Lord knows but death is a certainty.

Why can’t we live like we’re dying?

Life really is short. I remember meeting my wife and here we are 15 years later with three big kids! Time truly flies. How much of my time so far on this earth has been wasted not truly living my life? The answer would probably shock me, the amount of time on the TV alone is scary.

Do I live everyday now like I’m dying? NO. This is easier said than done and it’s a daily fight but I’m determined to live a life of no regrets. I am aware of how precious time is and as much as possible I’m learning to live fully present. I’ve changed my mindset!

How are you living your life?

When you start to really understand what this means, things will change, priorities will change. All those doubts, fears and negative voices of others won’t seem as loud because you don’t have time to hear them.

Start today

I don’t know where you’re at in your life right now but I want to tell you from personal experience that living your dream life is possible. I’ve been where you’re at, I know exactly what you’re going through and I can vouch for the fact that there IS a way out.

You don’t need anymore information because there’s already a wealth of information that proves you can do this. If you have been hesitating or struggling, it’s time to realize that you’ll never get that time back.

Today is the day to take action, today is the day to start planning, today is the day to change the way you think about life, time and your dream. If you have already started down this road, today is the day to get refreshed, to get a fresh dose of inspiration and push even harder.

Life is short, it really is. How are you living like you’re dying? What specific actions have you taken since the beginning of this year?

One Day At A Time

Man, it’s been a good week so far, I’m really proud of myself. I’ve beaten the struggle and gotten up at five am every morning this week for my run. The run’s were great and I’ve watched my diet.

And then came tomorrow… All that progress down the drain, all the hard work wasted by one minute of weakness. I woke up and had my run, I was doing good on my diet until lunch. Lunch was my downfall, I absolutely pigged-out.

I had my meal all set, my portion was just right, yet I ate that portion plus a bunch of other stuff, I even ate some pure junk food. I ate so much that my stomach hurt and my spirit was broken. I had done good for so long and with one weak moment, my progress was washed down the drain.

Now what?

I sat there that afternoon defeated and wondering was it even worth it to continue to push myself towards my goal of weighing 190 pounds? I’ve already made good progress, right?

That next morning I got up and looked at my running shows, should I put them on? I sat there for a minute going back and forth with myself, there were some pretty convincing arguments for either choice.

As I sat there, it hit me like a ton of bricks, today was a new day! Yesterday was already over and in the books, that big mistake and failure with my diet was all done. Today was a fresh start and I had the power to eat right today and win with my diet.

Boom! The decision was made, I put those shoes one and doubled my run, 10 strong miles in the books, I drank a ton of water that day and crushed my diet, not even a thought of cheating. Man, feels good

The next morning the alarm clock goes off and the journey and challenges start all over again, will I win today? Here’s a better question: will you win in your journey and dealing with your struggles???

A proven formula for success in chasing your dream

So….. This is your year, right? You’re tired of existing, you’re tired of being in survival mode, this is the year you’re going to make your dream life your real life. I’m excited for you, I remember that exact moment I made the shift in my mind, it was scary but super freeing.

You may start off on this journey and right away see success, until that one day when you just can’t do anything right. Your website goes down, the haters come out of the woodwork, your spouse tells you they hate your latest post. Now what?

How can you still push forward after a failure or an extremely rough time?

You can push forward by taking this journey one day at a time. That’s it. Sound too simple? Everyday we wake up can be a fresh start and a new opportunity, we just have to understand the importance of this principle.

We should have the mindset of planning for the future and making longer term plans but when it comes to the daily grind of taking action on those plans, we have to handle it that way, daily. We can’t think about next week when we haven’t lived and worked on today.

Let me give you an example. If your goal is to lose 100 pounds this year, you can’t lose it all in one month. You have to go through the daily battle of eating right and exercising THAT day and then the next day and the next.

Once you do that consistently EACH day for so many days in a row, the weight starts to come off. Make sense? What about the reason you read this blog? Many here want to create a freedom based online business on the side and growing it to support their family.

You’re not going to start your blog and become Michael Hyatt tomorrow. You have to focus on building your thing one day at a time. Today you write two posts for your blog, tomorrow you write one guest post for a blog speaking to your target audience.

Day three you find groups on social media where your audience is and reach out and be of service to those communities. Day four you send out a letter to your email list offering exclusive but specific value you that helps them accomplish something.

Day five you work on creating your first thing to sell on your website to start making those first few dollars. Day six you answer emails from people asking for your help with something they’re struggling with. Day seven you rest

You take this big, huge, massive dream and break it down to what you need to work on each day, one day at a time and you grind it out. You don’t try to get it all done in one week and get frustrated when things don’t work out.

When you have those rough days, when everything goes wrong, you get through that day the best you can, you go to bed and you wake up the next day refreshed and ready to WIN! You don’t dwell on the failure or anger from the previous day, you cleanse that from your mind and spirit and focus on what needs to get done today.

Plan for the future but live out today

Please don’t misunderstand me. YES, have those long-term plans: I want to be the President by 2024, I want to be fully supported by my online business by 2015, I want to lose 100 pounds by mid 2016.

That’s a good way to plan but to get there, focus on one day and one win at a time. My friend Sutton Parks always says: “there’s no overnight successes.” There are only those people who grind it out, one day, one win at a time until they hit those big, crazy dreams.

If you failed today, lay in your bed tonight and realize that tomorrow’s a new day and a new opportunity to win and succeed!

What will you choose: let today’s failure hold you back or choose to start fresh and win?