Evan Sanders's Blog, page 75

Laying A Hero To Rest | Greg Plitt

 

Greg,

My heart is broken. This morning I woke up and read the news. You’ve passed. You were taken far too early. I sat in bed and cried. I cried for 10 minutes straight. You were my hero. You were my mentor. You had touched my life in so many ways. I didn’t have a chance to say goodbye Greg, so I’m writing you now…and hopefully one day I will be able to write this letter by hand and rest it where you have been buried. Forever and always you will be a hero of mine.

I don’t know how to describe the pain that I felt this morning. I felt like a piece of me had been taken away. I remember meeting you back a the Santa Clara Fit Expo with my sister for the first time after having followed you for a couple of years and I was starstruck. I couldn’t believe that I was going to meet a hero of mine. I stood there and waited to talk to you and finally everyone left around you and my sister said, “Go on now is your chance.” Talk about approach anxiety.

But that disappeared once we started talking. I told you about how much you did for me through my years after baseball was taken from me, how much you inspired me to go after my dreams and how much your words meant to me. Every single day I would listen to your speeches in my iPod urging me to push on no matter what – to become a man of integrity and honor – to make a difference in this world through my actions instead of my words.

You opened your heart to me in that moment. It’s a moment that I will never forget. I gave you a letter that day. I’m sure you have received thousands of letters from fans. Maybe, when you are in heaven, you will have a minute to open that letter if you haven’t already. Through my surgery, battles with food, and failing over and over again to achieve what I wanted to in my life, you always had encouraging words…never one thing negative was said.

You taught me to love the gym because it was a place where I could create my dreams through blood, sweat and tears. You taught me to love it because of how strong it would make me mentally. You taught me that the physical aspects were only results of how strong your mind was becoming. You taught me that no dream is too big and that I could do anything that I wanted with my life.

My heart is broken today because I couldn’t wait to show you what I was doing in my life since the last time we talked. I have been working so hard. I have been dreaming again. I have been giving it my best and it has changed my life. I couldn’t wait to see you in September for Mr. Olympia. You were the primary reason I was going. I wanted to take another picture again with you, but as a transformed man who had taken everything you had ever said to me to heart.

I can’t do that now, but writing you tonight is something I know that will reach you in one way or another.

You have changed my life.

So as I sat in my car this morning two weeks out from my first professional fitness shoot…I tried to find some place inside myself to deal with this pain in the face of losing a hero and having the hardest two weeks of work ahead of me. There were three hours of hard intense work that I had to do, and yet I was still looking for a reason to drag myself out of the car and get started.

“Sacrifice today for tomorrows betterment, you are willing to pay those payments with pain, because pain is just a message when you are fixing something that’s insufficient in your life.” – Greg Plitt

Then it came to me. Those encouraging words came to me. Going in there and giving everything I had to todays workout is exactly what you would want me to do. There was no better way to honor how much you meant to me than by giving today, the only day that I have, everything.

“One Hour of pain produces a lifetime of pride.” – Greg Plitt

You will be forever missed. You meant the world to me and I am still trying to find the strength in myself to move forward. The messages you instilled in me will be forever carried on through me…and I will make sure that in my journey, the world will also know who you were to me.

Rest in peace,

– Evan Sanders

 

 

Laying A Hero To Rest | Greg Plitt is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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14 Days

 

14 days. 14 days. 14 days.

Today, after a three hour workout, all I could think about was effort. How much effort was I giving? Do I have more in the tank? Can I do things better and make myself sharper? These questions kept piling up and I took a good chunk of time to really think about the answers to them. My effort has been close to as good as I can possibly make it. I keep thinking to myself, 14 days to make the biggest of differences you can. 14 days until you reach a goal that you have been dreaming about for years upon years.

So what do you have? What have you got left in the tank? Can you push as hard as you possibly can for the next 14 days to earn that spot at the table? Can you give just a little bit more, even though every single set burns and you have no energy left? This is the wall that everyone talks about. You are there. Here and now, you have your chance to get past it or let it stop you.

There’s no turning back.

I can’ turn back.

Every single day has to count. The diet and nutrition. The workouts. The cardio. It all has to count because of course there will be time after this…but there won’t be any time like this. 

You have to be hungry. I can already feel this demanding everything out of me…but I also know that there’s going to have to be a little piece of me that I find deep within in order to achieve this. I’m going to find something within myself that I didn’t know existed before. And when I find that, I’m going to tap into it and light myself on fire with more effort, motivation, and belief.

They say the last week of prep is the worst. I believe it’s pretty bad. But what I know is that I want this so much more that I am willing to accept whatever happens.

I am ready.

14 days.

Lets go.

– Evan Sanders

14 Days is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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Making This Life Count

I’m going through changes.

These are some of my favorite lines from an Eminem song unsurprisingly called “Going Through Changes.” But way back then, when I was going through these changes, I was hurting real bad. I was going through forced changes – and not the types you really want to have in your life. The ones that make you into something else and change your situation despite your best efforts. Those are the hardest changes – but they are part of life and the ones we have to accept.

But these changes are different.
You could title this post many things, but awakening would probably resonate the best with the message of this piece.

For the longest time I felt this stress tearing at my from the inside. In fact, there was one person in my life who told me straight up as clear as day that she thought I was “at war with myself.” I was. I was battling myself like crazy. I think the only place where she went wrong was in assuming that I was heading in the wrong direction. You see, it’s the strangest feeling in the world to know that you are meant for more and yet stuck in a prison…held hostage by your mind. The enemy does not need to fight you anywhere else but in your mind. It can and destroy your heart, body, motivation, work ethic, finances, friendships, relationships…and anything else that is controlled by your mind – which by the way…is everything.

Your mind is your most powerful tool you will ever have. If you can convince yourself that you can do something, it can be done. Your mind can power through the grandest obstacles and help dig you out of the biggest holes. You just have to be willing to believe. When you thoroughly believe, then, you will give yourself the chance to use the rest of your gifts to get to work.

But without belief, everything else will fade away.

I didn’t believe things were possible until I traveled down this path. I think for each of us there’s a defining moment where we begin to see with our eyes that things are changing…that they are possible and we can actually achieve what we dreamed of. That moment solidifies our belief, and then we can start to make further and further out gambles with our visions knowing that it is indeed…possible.

 

Our determination and how we constantly strive to persevere is an indicator of how much belief we hold in ourselves.

Our belief can be damaged and it can also be repaired. We can restore belief through momentum created by actions. Because in this world, there’s nothing else that changes the course of your future like the actions of today. Without them, we are simply stuck in the mud with no way out. That “being at war with yourself” feeling is perpetuated by inaction…and the more you don’t do the worse you are going to feel about yourself.

Sometimes, you just have to go for it.

You have to say…well, I don’t know exactly how and I don’t know exactly how long…but I am making this happen because I know that I can. That’s a lot easier when you have had something in the past where you have accomplished something big and had to run off of faith. It’s easier to look back and go “I did it then I can do it now.” That’s where I am at right now. But it wasn’t always that way. That’s when you have to build something yourself and really create a foundation you can work off of.

That’s the beauty of putting down a solid foundation. The rest of the house can always be rebuilt if it needs to be, but that solid foundation of who you are as a person and what beliefs you have determines how strong you can be when the storm comes.

And trust me, that storm always shows up.

– Evan Sanders

 

Making This Life Count is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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New Day | Bringing These Emotions To Light

Many times I wonder how I am learning to handle it? How am I learning to let these pains go? How can I see people come and go in my life despite my best efforts and still be ok? How can I start a brand new day without dragging yesterday into it?

Some days are a a lot harder than others. If there’s one thing I’ve learned through years of working on this, it’s that everything…and I mean everything…is fluid. It’s every changing, morphing, adapting and adjusting. While we all have our own paths, and we lose, lose, lose, we also have to realize that we are being primed to win, win, win. Today in many ways there were major wins. But in many ways, there were painful losses. And that’s life. Balanced as it can be.

 

It truly is the hardest thing in the world. Seeing people come and go. Many of them don’t actually leave you, but they aren’t there anymore. The soul of it disappears and you are left with feelings of what once was. People and the way they make you feel are addicting at times. We have our happiest of moments and support during our lowest of lows. When that’s gone…then what?

I try not to say goodbye anymore. I don’t say goodbye because time and time again I have been proven wrong about things. As much as I think things have ended something always comes around full circle. It may take days, it may take years…but it always happens…and every single time I am knocked off my feet.

When things like this happen, we have pull into our faith. We have to believe that everything is going to turn out okay and with each new day we will be given the opportunity to show our appreciation for the people and the things we have in our lives.

It’s hard to get to that place of appreciation sometimes. It’s hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel when all we can see is what is happening right now in the moment – pain. This is hard to say, but my understanding of the way life works is only through having spent a great deal of time dealing with these situations in the first place. I’ve only learned through experience. It’s one that I never wish upon anyone, but know that it’s only going to make it’s mark on wisdom if they experience it themselves.

The new day.

It’s a promise. It’s a promise that something great can begin once again. It’s an opportunity to build upon the old and start over if need be. We have a chance to do something great, but most importantly, to keep deeply loving.

Because without that, we would be half the people we could be. Without deeply loving one another, all of the bad things that go on would just consume us in a heartbeat. Do not be discouraged by the negatives, they are only there to remind you of the positives.

– Evan Sanders

New Day | Bringing These Emotions To Light is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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When Your Dreams Are In The Oven

 

Make Dreams Come True

It’s possible. It’s all possible. Words that have come out of my mouth before but I never truly believed. I never truly believed them because I didn’t have a personal example in my life where I actually felt that. That mixture between a deep sense of pride and love for what I was doing. I was close once, but it wasn’t in the cards. It was possible for me but the sacrifices were too great. So I had to make the decision to stop.

Life went on dreamless for a while.

Through my personal experience, I have seen first hand that you can change a reality you don’t like. The problem is, it takes an incredible amount of work. But like working with clay, what is cold and hard at the beginning begins to heat up and take shape over time. You have to give it time. Without giving something the proper amount of time when you apply your efforts to it, it will simply stay a lump in your hands.

Coming up with a plan and then giving things time to cook is crucial.

Have you ever taken something out of the oven before it is fully baked? That experienced could make you sick for days. You either wish you had left it in the oven or never actually wished it existed in the first place. Trust me…food poisoning is the worst.

 

It may take longer than you think. When I hit my first 14 week goal I realized that it was probably going to take me a lot longer to actually achieved what I had always dreamed of. Besides, years and years of bad habits cannot all just be turned around in 3 short months. They take time to break and model new habits that will help you become more successful.

If it takes more time, that’s just an indicator for you to put it back in the oven and go back to work. Patience is key. Patience is so important because that’s one of the single traits that allows you to understand that the end result will eventually come…if you just give it a chance. We live in a society that is so fast paced and “DO IT NOW” that when it doesn’t happen right now we think it won’t happen at all.

They say that overnight success takes 10 years.

I believe it.

What dream do you have right now that’s cooking?

– Evan Sanders

 

When Your Dreams Are In The Oven is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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Going In One More Round

Tonight I find myself in a pretty interesting place. In fact, it’s a brand new place. When I was 12 years old I remember beginning to have the seed of a dream planted into my head. I dreamed of being in incredible shape. at some point in my life because I was a bit “husky” (as they used to call it) when I was young. So I started my efforts. I tried everything. I tried programs, diets, and many other things to accomplish this dream. I made promises…and failed to follow through with them. To myself – to others. I tried to do it to “the the girl” or become popular. I tried and tried…and i would get about halfway in…and quit. I would run out of gas or just give up completely. Food became a comfort…so I would run to that every time…and after I quit, I would send myself 10 steps backwards with munching on everything in sight.

When I moved home from LA I was 218 and 18% body fat…probably the heaviest I have ever been. I’ll never forget the day I made a decision that would change my life – do this for you…no one else, not the girl, not the popularity, not the body…do this because you love it and you know deep inside that it’s going to help you become the best version of you. So I drew 100 tick marks on the chalkboard in my room and started. Day 1 – 218. By day 100, without fail I had lost 30lbs and more importantly, I followed through with something I said I was going to do. But after the high of achieving this goal was over, I actually felt like “it wasn’t it.” I felt like I had gone part of the way…not all the way.

Going in one more round when you don’t think you can – that’s what makes all the difference in your life – Rocky

So I went in one more round. I found myself an incredible trainer who believed in my vision just as much as I did…and committed to another 12 weeks. Never in my life have I been more challenged. He took everything I had ever done and melted it down to their foundation and rebuilt me. Tears have come out during these workouts. I’ve thrown up more than a handful of times and yet every day, I go in one more round…trying to push a little bit more…trying to squeeze out one more rep. And along the way of trying to achieve this dream…I found out what true courage means, what refusing to give up is, what it means to discipline yourself and to work as hard on something as you can when you are the only one that actually sees the dream in your mind…and even though it hasn’t been created yet…you know you are getting closer.

So I sit here tonight in a new place because I can see just how close I am getting. The date…January 31st, the date of my first fitness shoot ever is coming…and here I am 20 days out hungry…knowing that the hardest part is arriving at the beginning of next week. But I’m hungry – and that’s the newest feeling to me. I’m hungry for the work, for the pain, for the hours and hours spent with weights and cardio equipment because with every rep and step I am getting closer. I can see it, I can taste it, I can feel it, It’s right there for the taking.

I don’t know what January 31st will bring…because I’ve never been there before. I’ve never been 6% body fat like I am right now…but I know the goal is 4…and I know I’m going to work my butt off these next 3 weeks to bring in the best version of myself as possible for this shoot.

Here’s the kicker to all of this. I know many people out there made resolutions this year, and if you are hitting walls right now…you know those walls that are designed to show you just how bad you want something…keep going. Find a way. Find a way through it, over it, past it, under it, around it…becoming a living preposition. Because one day, you will cry tears of joy that you did it. You actually did it. And no one will be able to take that away from you. No one will be able to take away the endless hours of work you put into it…because you built yourself, you created yourself, and you will carry that with you for the rest of your life continuing to build yourself every single day. That’s the magic of just how powerful we are. 

Going In One More Round is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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Die & Blossom All Over Again

 

Each night we die and every morning we blossom once again.

The biggest mystery, now answered, that I have come across is in our true ability to be people who can live in the past, the future, and the present. I don’t think anything else in the world can do this. We can instantaneously go back in our minds, and if we give it enough thought, fully relive things that have happened and evoke the emotions that occurred during that time. People say we can’t go back into the past and change it…but the mystery that has been answered for me is that we actually have more ability to change our past than we think. Like anything in this world, our past is ever changing and flowing just as much as the present and the future. Stay with me here.

I had one interesting month in November, where I was able to look back at the past and see significant event’s that had changed in my life for what they actually were instead of what I had interpreted them to be. It is true, a dead true fact that we cannot go back and change the events that have happened previously. That I will never argue with. However, we can go back and change our understanding of the events…and that’s where the magic happens.

If you change the lenses covering your eyes, you will see the world in a different light.

This world I refer to can indeed be the past, present and future. I have seen it, I have done it, and I can do it when I need to. I can change my past by seeing it differently…and this can be with thousands of different angles and lenses. Do not be scared to go back and view what has happened in your life and begin to understand that you had far more power than you originally thought. You were far more responsible. You were far more powerful in how much control you had over your reactions and actions.

IF we go back with a premise of understanding, then we can change. We can change ourselves in viewing a time that has already passed…and those actions have significant ripples into our present and future.

We can change our present instantaneously.

Don’t believe me? There are countless scenarios in which you could change it all right now. Change that thing that has been troubling you for some time. Apologize to that person who hasn’t talked to you in years. Change your situation. Change your outcomes. Change your visions. Change your perceptions.

These things can all change. Now I am no fool and I perfectly understand that some situations take time to mold and change. But your reality of seeing a situation for what it is vs. your perception can be instantaneous…and just like in dealing with your past…that has major ripples into the future.

The hardest thing I’ve ever done is be able to understand that what I saw for myself in the future was actually possible. We all dream. We all have high ambitions. And yet, over time, those ambitions are crushed for one reason or another. We may have the plague of someones words telling us that we can never amount to anything, a bad relationship, a non supportive family, no family….the list goes on. The ways that “life” can take you out of your game are often cruel, endless, and unforgiving. But maybe that’s the plan. Maybe these walls are thrown in front of us so we can understand what it really means to take something to the next level in terms of our output of effort.

There’s no replacement for hard, hard work.

There’s a phrase that has been going around lately via the “quoteasphere” that says “work smarter not harder.” To some extent I agree…but the problem is many people don’t even know how to work hard in the first place. This is one of the more important lessons I have learned. How to work incredibly hard and dedicate myself to something fully.

Half measures rarely work.

They rarely work for one reason…have you ever tried cannonballing into a pool with one leg still on the deck?

Imagine the pain in that one.

You have to fully commit…and especially to your dreams. Your dreams demand the best out of you. Anything short of that effort you won’t be worthy of them. That just seems to be the way they work? Don’t blame me…I didn’t create them.

Every morning you die & blossom all over again.

Bloom fully today.

– Evan Sanders

 

Die & Blossom All Over Again is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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Life Isn’t About Finding Yourself

Life isn’t about finding yourself, it’s about creating yourself. Day in. Day out.

When I was younger, I was lost. Really lost. So lost, in fact, that I believed that life was indeed about finding myself. Finding something that I thought was always there but could never grasp onto it. I believed that if I looked hard enough for myself, eventually he would show up on my front step and say, “Well here I am. Here you go. Everything you’ve been looking for.” That ideology led to many troubled and anxiety filled years. I also never found myself.

I’m not a treasure seeker…I’m an adventurer…and there’s a huge difference.

I don’t seek answers, treasure, wisdom, you could extend this list to anything in which you go out into the world to find it. I stopped that a long time ago. Seeking money, women, physique, power doesn’t really lead to a fulfilled life. I dropped all of that for adventure. I dropped all of that for visions and grand dreams. Because my visions are far bigger than anything that money could buy or all the ego stroking recognition could get someone.

I lead my life in a way where I create opportunities for myself through action, sweat, and tears. I bring visions to reality by understanding that it’s about creating yourself not about finding a version of you somewhere deep in the woods that you’ve never seen before. I used to say a long time ago that I wanted to go back to “an old version of me” where I thought things were so much better. Those were my teenage years. But what I didn’t realize was that the teenage version of me that existed years before was wishing for another version of me. So there was no winning. When I was living in the present day I was wishing for something I could find in the future…and then when I got to the future I would be looking back wishing for times of old. Neither of those lined up very well. Further, I always missed one thing – the present.

Adventurer’s head out with minimal expectations except to explore. yes we have a direction and a heading, but we don’t know what we are going to discover about the landscape, and more importantly, ourselves when we head out. I think parts of me used to be scared to head out into the deep woods for a long time because deep down I knew that this was the place where I heard my inner voice the most. I knew that the dialogue would begin and I would discover in those moments that I was powerful beyond measure.

We are. We are powerful beyond measure and we can’t even begin to grasp what we are capable of.

We are capable of creating the world in front of us. Whatever we want it to look like, through the power of our minds and our hands, we can begin to fashion it through effort and action. Nothing else is capable of that. We truly are given one of the most powerful tools ever created: ourselves.

 

There are no perfect moments. There are only the moments, ordinary moments, where you act extraordinarily – that’s what makes them perfect. We wait far too much for the perfect time, the perfect moment, the perfect shoes, the perfect lover, the perfect person to come along and save us. We think that it will in turn make us whole, complete us fully…but the reality is much different. The reality is this: these things will only add to your life (sometimes they subtract), but this journey is mostly yours. You are born into this world as one and you will go out as one. We can add things into our lives that make us happy and we can subtract those that hurt us. There’s an incredibly true balance of life that happens when we fall out of sync with overdoing any one of these things…and we are returned back into finding the middle ground.

The middle ground itself is your balancing point. Don’t think that means living a life of mediocrity. This point may sound incredibly unbalanced to others, but it’s not built for them. Those who believe in the beauty of their dreams and take the brave leap of attempting them will have points that move farther and farther off the curve. Just the way it works…and it comes with it’s own consequences.

Create. Create. Create.

Every day, create with what you’ve been given. For me, that’s creating my life through writing, reading, lifting, and interacting with people. That’s where I feel like I am most alive. I’ve had to push myself back into action in many ways because I wasn’t doing those things, and when I am not I am most certainly unfulfilled.

We can realize our potential only through one way – you have to go out and compete with it every damn day.

Nuff’ said.

– Evan Sanders

 

 

Life Isn’t About Finding Yourself is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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Far Alone

I’ve been waking up to the roar of 100,000 on my phone every morning.

The crowds buzzing, chanting, clapping, and finally when one of my favorite bands comes out on stage…they go nuts. Every morning, I get goosebumps listening to this. I close my eyes again listening to it, but not to fall asleep…because I am so awake. Even at 4:30 in the morning, as soon as I hear that sound…my mind brightens, awakes, starts imagining the possibilities. 

I jump out of bed in my unheated apartment, walk to my computer, throw some more music on that gets me going, brush my teeth, put clothes on, mix up my pre-workout and I am out the door and driving to the gym by 4:50. iPod gets plugged in. Motivational speeches come on. I hear men and women passionately preaching about their dreams, hard work, goals, fighting for what you believe in…the messages continue on and on.

Park the car at the gym, put my headphones in, put my stuff in the locker, and straight onto the stair master. More messages. More speeches. More songs. Down pours the sweat. 

I get lost in myself in the beginning of the day. Everything but what I am doing disappears. Problems go away. Anxieties disappear. Stress is released through the weights. I get lost for hours. Rep after rep. Set after set. I close my eyes and feel that connection between the bar and the muscle I am working on. I can make it fire the way I want it to. I’m not just “doing it” to do it. There’s intent behind every action. Every rep. Every set. 

I’ve been on something different lately. 

It’s not a drug. It’s not a type of drink. It’s not a special diet pill or substance. It’s not a secret sauce or food. It’s actually, exactly the opposite. It’s purity in it’s finest form. Fresh water. Fresh food. Fresh thoughts. And then there’s resistance of the heaviest kind…and in combination with these two things, purity and resistance…my body, mind, and heart have changed drastically. My vision is coming into reality…and life is changing right before my eyes. 

This is new. So incredibly new. So new, in fact, it’s very hard to describe the sensation of it even happening. 

There’s this part in every journey when you travel far alone. You leave the shore, full of familiar faces, places, and comforts…and it’s only after 5-7 weeks of traveling do you fully leave behind what was on the shore. You can still imagine what it was like in your head. You can see the things of the past just as if it was yesterday. And then you continue to travel because it is far too late to turn back on a 12 week voyage. You enter this period of time where it’s lonely. You begin to have doubts if you are going to make it. No matter how many times you have made the voyage there is still that little period of uncomfortable time that causes a little bit of anxiety.

Am I ready?

Am I making as much progress as I need to be making?

What if I fail?

What if the end isn’t like I had imagined it to be?

These questions can flood your boat. They can drown you if you give them too much time to sit around on the deck. Or you can bucket them right out of your vessel just as fast as they came in. Those negative thoughts will always be there, but it’s your job as the captain to continue forward with a belief that will send these thoughts back down into the depths. 

So you continue on this journey, and you hit week 8, week 9 and all of the sudden, your excitement begins to brew. That overwhelms everything. You start to see signs of the end of the journey, milestones as they may be, and your joy…even though this is the most challenging and hardest part of the entire journey, outweighs everything else there is. 

You will struggle to fight the dragon in front of the cave. That dragon…in this case, is all your fears, doubts, anxieties and worries lined up ready to take you out right before the finish line. You have to understand that all of these things will make their last stand – but you don’t have to fight them. 

All you have to do is endure. 

Endure it for that last week. Endure it long enough and they will fall away from you…and when you land on the shore, you will be a changed person. You will win. You will finally win. 

And that is the greatest feeling in the world. 

- Evan Sanders 

Far Alone is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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The Price You Pay | Ambition

Never before, in my entire life, have I had such an intense purpose and belief in what I am doing. 

I can say as another first, that my passion for what I am doing has officially outweighed my passion for baseball…and that is saying a lot. This trifecta of things I am going after in my life right now has given me newfound courage, direction, and despite how physically, spiritually, and emotionally draining it can be at times, every morning, at 4:40am I wake up with an excitement to continue down this path. 

They say you get addicted to success. Right now I can’t tell you how true that is. There’s this weird feeling when you see the progressions from 1.0 version of self to 2.0…and now to 3.0 – all backed up by blood, sweat, and tears. Confidence comes along with that. The ability to challenge yourself more and more comes along for the ride as well. 

I posted this quote to my Facebook page last night because I’ve never seen it before…and I am absolutely in love with it for many reasons. 

“The longer you look back, the farther you can look forward.” – Winston Churchill

There have been many times throughout this journey that I have found profound quotes that completely fit into the ideology behind this project…I just didn’t know it yet. The quote by Churchill reminds me of why I look back at the things that have happened in my life so much. To give myself the chance to stay out of the past however, I look back at specific events as thoroughly as I can, learn from them as much as possible, write about them with truth and heart and then decide to move on. If you spend too much time obsessing over specific events that have happened in the past, you will never be able to escape from living there. You shouldn’t live there. Not because you can’t, but because it stops you from living here…in the most important time there is…the now. 

 Understanding my past for what it actually is, what actually happened, and what the consequences were have allowed me to actually not repeat my history. As hard as those decisions have been sometimes, I know that I am making the right ones. I know I am making the right decisions because I have learned from my past ones…which usually were bad ones. 

There’s something else to this that needs to be mentioned. Trust in yourself. Trust in your  gut feeling and what that voice on the inside is trying to tell you. I didn’t trust that for a long time for every reason there is (a line probably longer than the distance to the sun back then). But now, I understand that the feelings that come up inside of me can be trusted. They aren’t explosive. They are rooted in love. They are rooted in passion. The only time I really have to try to check myself is when those character traits are starting to be attacked – then I get defensive. The jury is still up on whether or not that is ok – something to explore in the future. 

Ambition is a funny thing. I found this the other day and wanted to write about it. 

The Cost Of Ambition

Late nights, early mornings
Lots of associates, very few friends
You will be misunderstood. Constantly
You will be single unless you’re lucky enough to find someone who understands your lifestyle
People will want you to do good but never better than them. And for that reason you will do a lot of things alone

That’s all very interesting to me. It’s interesting because I have experienced all of those at one time or another. In fact, these past couple years, if that was a checklist that ensured ambition was indeed present, would be filled with check marks all over the place. You lose people because they don’t understand the way you live, people talk poorly about you behind your back, and people overtly or secretly want you to fail and they often make that known through their words or interactions…or lack of actions. There will be very very few close friends and plenty of grinding. Those early mornings test you every single day and the sacrifices you have to make for weeks on end make you sometimes doubt if you are missing out on anything. The price of ambition is high, the sacrifices are high, but if you are willing to take it on…it will pay you back 100 times over. 

I used to doubt what I was doing…maybe that’s why I failed so many times. 

But now, the doubts have wilted away. They have left as the weeks have gone by because every single day there is a constant proving with actions that are far louder than words. Intent means very little in the face of actions.

Actions are the house, foundation, and building materials…intent is the wallpaper. 

Build your future one action at a time. Know why you are doing what you are doing…because then you will have results for every action. These are things you can measure, look at, analyze…and when the time is right move forward in making better decisions or continue down the path you are on. Stick it out. Make sure you spend a chunk of time committing to something and see what it’s like before moving in another direction. Deciding that something is not for you is not giving up, it’s being smart about your life, what you want from it, and if it fits in your path. Be loving. Be giving. Be understanding. Stand up for yourself when you need to. And grind. Grind your butt off. 

- Evan Sanders 

P.S. Make sure you comment below. I would love to hear your thoughts.

The Price You Pay | Ambition is a post from: Inspirational Stories About Life

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