Evan Sanders's Blog, page 84

Taking Off The Masks We Wear

If only we could take off the masks we wear.

Wouldn’t things be much simpler? I think so, I think that masks are the reason why we fail to connect with others. I know that I am most uncomfortable when I am putting forward a face or persona of a person who I am certainly not. When does this usually happen? In big groups of people I don’t know. I found that out about myself months ago…that I get nervous and try to play down what I am doing with my life for some reason. It reminds me of the idea that the world does not benefit from your playing small. It benefits the greatest from you shining your light and believing that you can achieve anything.

The truth is, there are still many things that scare the crap out of me.

Honest. In fact, I could safely say that since I have started this project, I am more scared than I have ever been. But here’s the thing, I have also developed much more courage, and over the past few months, an ability to go directly into something…despite being full of fear…and just seeing what I am capable of. Without one you cannot have the other.

I had an interesting experience this weekend in Tahoe that I want to talk about. In the morning when my best friend and my sister and her friend went out to go for a bike ride, I decided that I wanted to go for a bit of a hike. I drove to a medium grade trail and then in a moment of inspiration decided to drive another five minutes to the hardest hike in the area. Donner Peak, a mountain that I have climbed a handful of times off-trail is challenging, slightly dangerous, full of big rocks that you have to put your hands and feel to work for, and overall one hell of a climb was what I chose to do. The weekend before I had climbed it with my dad and my sister, and completed it in roughly 2.5 hours.

This time, I wanted to see how fast I could go.

So I set my watch, and booked up the mountain. A mile scratching, clawing, wheezing, talking to myself, listening to music, taking breaks for 10 seconds to catch my breath and continuing to move on. I went and went and went and hardly stopped until I hit the top. But on the way up I had this thought. “What’s the point of working so hard in the gym and doing all of the cardio if you don’t go out into the wild and challenge yourself to your max?” That motivated me even further. Never once, even though I put myself in some precarious situations, did I feel unsafe or that I was in trouble.

I hit the top in 36 minutes.

I had this moment up on the top of the mountain that is hard to explain. But in looking up to the sky, I gave the nod as if to say “I did this for you. Thank you for keeping me healthy this past 11 weeks, and I am going to continue to do things like this, to push myself, to put myself outside of my comfort zone and to challenge every piece of my body and mind to be something greater.”

See I believe that if you don’t attempt things that you haven’t mastered before then you are literally solidifying yourself into mediocrity

I think one of the greatest challenges of life is not facing what is thrown at you, but in facing yourself every day, and challenging yourself to try things that you have never done before. To me, that’s hard. Because it is so easy to stay where you are comfortable. It’s so easy to take the path, the one that I almost chose that day, that has been walked upon by everyone else. Sometimes, you need to climb that mountain. Sometimes, you need to go as hard as you can and see what happens.

That mountain will stay in my mind for a long time. That mountain for me signifies a very pure moment when I took off one of the masks I wear and put myself to the test.

I think one of the reasons why I enjoy writing so much is that I can take the things I learn in daily life and apply them to a different state of being or idea.  What I mean by this is that maybe climbing a mountain in itself has nothing to do with life in its simplest form, but when you take what you learned from that experience, it is something that builds you up instead of brings you down. The masks we wear are only taken off when we go outside of our common self and do something beyond which we think we are capable.

Then, we are heroes in the making.

Because in every scene of life, we can make the decision to tear off the masks we wear and face fear dead in the face. We can stare it down and destroy it through action. Without that though, we are sheep to fear. I would rather be a lion. Wouldn’t you?

Take off your mask.

- Evan Sanders

The post Taking Off The Masks We Wear appeared first on The Better Man Project.

O’ To Love…How Rare That Is

 

O’ to love, how rare that truly is. The things we love in this world last only so long. Yes, it may only be 5 minutes, 5 years, or an entire lifetime, but in the end we part. How lucky we are to have something so fantastic at one point in time that makes the ending of the journey so hard. But for those who love unconditionally…for those who love with their whole heart and understand that we are all sentenced, we stay present with the person we love. We make that moment last as long as we can because who truly knows when those moments will be no more. Our love is the thing that miracles are made of. Our love is the thing that can truly and authentically change the world. We see people all the time fall in love with something they are doing, and the world changes around them. We see people who fall in love with someone, and their energy, the two of them together as a unit creates something that other people can see and feel.

Love transcends.

Love is a type of energy that cannot be explained.

Words are no match for it. Even when the finest of words are used in the most elegant way, only a scratch is made on truly describing what love is. This is why our hearts literally break when love crashes and burns. Recovery seems a distant cousin. We enter into a true state of loss because the person we were with were truly our other set of eyes, hands and legs.

Our friends, our work, our relationships, all can be deeply loved. Not childish “love” but I’m talking about the type of truly deep and vulnerable love, where you have no fear in your mind about telling that person the worst about yourself, the secrets you have kept, because you know that love transcends all. You give someone the tools to absolutely destroy you down to your core, and you trust them with everything inside of you not to.

Love however, can be a fleeting thing.

And that is how it is supposed to be. As humans, we try to hold onto the good things as long as we can, but sometimes the good just runs out and the balance of life takes a dip from what we had. We are meant to be brought down, so we can in fact rise again. I’ve always thought that the person I truly fell in love with, my soulmate, wouldn’t just be the one who would be on the rise with me, but the one who would support me and even help me walk through those dips in life.

The love that I have felt in the past has been wonderful, life changing, incredible, and yet at all the same time fleeting. Things happen, things change, and as the years have gone by, I have found more and more ways to appreciate what I had versus what I lost. I think that has been a major turning point for me. My soul opens like a blooming flower every time I give myself the opportunity to experience life. The good and the bad. The strength of an ancient redwood is built into my core and flowers of experience, passion, and wisdom bloom throughout my soul.

We are meant to experience the things we do on the paths we choose.

Hold onto what you can while you have it and deeply love those around you. Cold and hard hearts are for the weak. That is fear talking. That is fear trying to protect the one thing you know that could truly make you vulnerable. Overt and outspoken strength is not strength at all. It’s weakness trying to convince an audience that it is something else.

Vulnerability and a gentle heart is true strength. The path allows you to confront even your greatest fears with passion and vigor.

Love deeply.

Love passionately.

Love vulnerably.

Love with no fear.

- Evan Sanders

 

The post O’ To Love…How Rare That Is appeared first on The Better Man Project.

Guts Over Fear – The Final Chapter

Run out of excuses with every word

So here I am and I will not run
Guts over fear, the time is here

Guts over fear, I shall not tear

For all the times I let you push me around and push me down

Guts over fear, guts over fear

…

Now I don’t wanna seem indulgent when I discuss my lows and my highs

My demise and my uprise, pray to God

I just opened enough eyes later on
Gave you the supplies and the tools to hopefully use it to make you strong
And enough to lift yourself up when you feel like I felt

Cause I can’t explain to y’all how dang exhausted my legs felt
Just having to balance my damn self
Those dang eggshells, I was made to walk

- “Guts Over Fear, Eminem

I remember one time reading somewhere that Jerry Rice, one of the best football players ever, ran scared. He said he was so fast because he was absolutely terrified of the opposition catching him.

Living without fear, is living without one of the most important and motivating inputs we can tap into.

However, fear can paralyze you just as fast. It can make you stuck, turn off all the lights, take your limbs from you and put the pressure of thousands of pounds down upon you. Fear can do all of that. In fact, fear can do that for your entire life. I’ve seen it. I’ve seen the lady stand up in front of the crowd saying she lived her life in fear and even worse…she lived her life thinking she wasn’t worth it.

That was one of the most defining moments of my life.

Watching that woman, a 65 year old woman in tears testifying in front of 200 people that she had spent her whole entire life thinking she wouldn’t amount to anything tore something open inside of me. I was only 22 at the time, but I knew that moment was a moment  that would last forever in my mind.

You’re nuts if you say you aren’t scared. You are absolutely batsh*t crazy. Everyone gets scared. Everyone feels fear. Everyone needs to feel these emotions. Not only because they protect you in some instances, but because if you aren’t coming up against the edge, you aren’t growing. You aren’t taking steps in a new direction. Sayings you aren’t afraid of anything isn’t strength, that’s weakness pretending to be strength. Because guaranteed there are things  that are going to come along in your life that will instill the fear of god into you and oh the surprise you will have, the “I am not afraid of anything person,” when your gut tightens up, you get chills up your spine and your ability to move seizes. No. Fear all feel fear. But it’s not all about that.

Courage, is taking one step past fear. Courage, is about having guts over fear.

That’s what I focus on. Not on denying myself emotions, but being able to work with them. That’s what I have been trying to do for almost four years now. Because I can remember way back when I started…that I was terrified of what I was going to write down. I was hurting and everything inside of me resembled an emotional tornado. Go ahead, try to pretend a tornado isn’t there…doesn’t work.

Feel it.

Whenever emotions come up, feel them. The good and the bad. Tap into them. We are taught from a young age, especially with the negative emotions, that feeling sad or angry or upset is a bad thing. It’s not. It’s part of the learning process. What’s even worse is that we are almost made to feel wrong for feelings these emotions. Our parents usually tried to mediate  the situation as much as possible by trying to give us a cookie or do something to cheer us up and it was quite effective. But when you continue to grow up and things get a little more intense, and you start to go through situations that horribly diminish your self-esteem and confidence, and these emotions start to creep in…there’s no cookie or toy that can make you happy again. So we suffer. Some of us, try to find the equivalent of the “cookie or toy” in adult terms. Some of us go to food, alcohol, drugs, sex, the works. This system is broken.

If you don’t know where you are going, well, any direction will really do. But don’t go nowhere.

If you get stuck, start moving, start searching. You don’t have to have the answer from the onset. Think how easy those math problems would have been if we had the answer at the start and could simply say “solved!” Life doesn’t work that way. Not even close. In fact, the “answers” to the true secrets don’t even come to you until you are 6, 7 ,8 , 9 or however many weeks into your journey. Why?

Because you are on new ground.

Undiscovered paths always open your eyes to the new possibilities of the world…and new possibilities for your life.

It all takes guts over fear.

You have to have some guts to go out there and be willing to make an absolute fool of yourself. You have to have LOTS of guts to go out there, after you have gone out there a thousand times, and risk it all again and again until you win. I have major respect for those people.

Look at what you are doing today, and if you don’t like what you have, then you are going to have to do something different. The worst news is usually the best news. This is because you learn that you are a product of all the decisions you have made up until this point, and to change that, you are going to have to make some serious course corrections.

The best part of all of this?…is that given enough time and effort, we can correct any course we have taken.

- Evan Sanders

The post Guts Over Fear – The Final Chapter appeared first on The Better Man Project.

The Helm Is Gripped: Ebb, Flow, Or Crash

There’s this idea that I have heard many times that always makes me think. It’s the concept of going with the flow of things and just seeing what happens.

I’m telling you, it gets to me every time. I have honestly thought about this over and over again in regards to my life and what I am up to…and I always come back with different answers on what type of concept I should try and adopt to see what happens.

I have met very carefree people who go with the flow.

I have met very determined people who recede from life to accomplish a goal as the ocean would ebb.

And I have met a few…very special people, who crash like a massive wave and seize opportunity when it arrives. 

Up until recently, up until about 5 minutes ago actually, I tried adopting these ideas singularly and was left with some pretty interesting results.

When I just go with the flow, life ends up taking me places…and a great deal of the time they are places that are great, but at the same time, they are not in direct accordance with my vision and my dreams. 

When I recede from life, I am miserable without communicating with a lot of the people I have around me, the 10 who serve as my right and left hands, the supporting cast, and then the people on the outskirts. When I disappear, I feel like a piece of me is lost. 

When I crash, when I seize, I am happy. Incredibly happy. I start to feel something clicking when this happens and I honestly would separate this quality from the other two because I feel like the moments in this life that truly are meant to be seized come irregularly and they are very special. These moments were meant for you to either take them or watch them pass. 

It’s amazing to me, how the concept of a trifecta comes back into my life over and over again. Mind, body, soul. Love, Passion, Never Quit. And now, Ebb, Flow, Crash. 

The latter idea has truly sparked some deep thought in my today…and this is where I get to the point of this entire blog. 

You don’t have to be one. 

In fact, you shouldn’t adopt one singularly…that demotes you to a less dynamic life. 2/3 less in fact. 

You have to adopt all three. You have to know when to go with the flow, when to exit on a journey, and to seize an opportunity when the moment is there. If you just do one, the other two parts, two amazing parts of life are going to be left unexperienced by you. 

If you just go with the flow, you may very well fail to put in the effort it takes to actually achieve your dreams. You may not be as disciplined as you need to be. You may lose that person in front of you. And the worst part of all, you may never know it’s actually happening because life’s current is actually taking you that way. 

Going with the flow is a great thing…don’t get me wrong. But I think there are times for it. 

If you believe the world is made up of energy and moving parts, then you might also grasp the idea that there are currents running through us and the universe right now. These currents can be felt all around the world. They can’t be seen, but they can be felt. Take all of the human rights abuses, wars, and disasters going on in our world right now. A young man in California can feel the energy that is putting off from halfway around the world. 

These currents are profound, and I believe that if you live your life just going with it…then you may be swept by these currents. Some are more profound than others. Some may have nothing to do with events going on in the world, but maybe a current produced by a friend or someone you are dating. 

I am a believer in the fact that the energy we produce and put out there in the world is a current that can be felt like many people. This, is always why I put out positive material every day for people to read. I believe that it has a ripple effect, and I am always finding some way to connect with more people and make an impact. I didn’t used to believe this. Now, after a few select events, I do…very much so.

If you disappear from the world and let your relationships falter…you lose a piece of yourself. Having great people around you is one of the joys of life. I never really understood what great relationships could be like with friends and loved ones until I reached the middle of my twenties. Now, I thoroughly enjoy people’s company, and seek it out quite often. Before, I was like a hermit. Afraid and self-conscious.

I believe that when you combine all three off these traits, Ebb, Flow, Crash…you become a unique individual. You must know when to grip the helm and take control of your life and move your ship in a new direction…a direction that for the time being may be against the current. But maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe that is you doing something that has never been done before? Breaking new ground and charting new waters is always a good thing. 

The trifecta.

Understand that balance is not a 50 50 thing. Balance is often a combination of 33 1/3 or even more broken down points. There are many different places on the sliding scale for different approaches. Bring them all together. 

Be relaxed enough to let your journey be dictated by the heavens.

Be focused enough to put in the work and demand the best from yourself. 

Be aware enough to crash and seize the opportunity when it arrives. 

- Evan Sanders 

The post The Helm Is Gripped: Ebb, Flow, Or Crash appeared first on The Better Man Project.

The Better Man Project Video Blog – Day 0

Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to introduce you to the brand spanking new….The Better Man Project Video Blog!

The video blog will be covering all sorts of topics and serves as an entirely new, fast, easily digestible medium that I can fire off some fun 2-5 minute conversations about topics that are on my mind, and serve as a great addition to the written blog.

I would love to know what you have to say!

- Evan Sanders

The post The Better Man Project Video Blog – Day 0 appeared first on The Better Man Project.

My Life, The Moneyball Game

It’s a process. It’s a process. It’s a process.

Moneyball, the movie, is a film that I have probably watched a good 10 times. Not only is Brad Pitt completely believable, but the story is amazing. The music though, oh man that music, the music does it for me. It is so good that it ended up in my iPod and is often listened to when I hit the gym.

It’s a process.

I won’t ruin the movie for you, but the basic premise is that the Oakland A’s baseball team, one that has absolutely no payroll and just lost all of their big players, has to reinvent how teams play the game and how they choose players to get the most bang for their buck. A statistician comes along who has a formula to change the game, Bean bites on the idea, and they are off.

It doesn’t work.

Well, for a while.

But eventually, when the players start to buy into the idea, it really starts to work. In fact, it works incredibly well, and they go off to set the single season record for any win streak in the MLB.

This movie resonated on many levels for me, but the reason why I come back to it over and over again is because of this concept of believing in the process.

When you start to do something new, it takes some time to germinate. That seed has been planted, and you have to water it and take care of it carefully or else it will never sprout. Some seeds, like some forms of bamboo have to be watered and maintained for 5 years before the nut even splits. 5 years! But then, they grow 90ft in 30 days. I mean what a transformation.

If we could all believe in ourselves just enough to know that at some point in the future, if we keep hammering away at our dreams, that our life will bloom 90ft in 30 days…wouldn’t we all put in the work? We would all maintain the belief that we “just knew” it was going to happen.

Things are going to work for you right out of the shoot. You have to give it some time. You will reach points along your journey as well where you need some help. You will need some coaching. You will need a mentor to help you get past where you are and off to where you are going. This just happened to me. I spent the last 9 weeks dieting and working out with everything that I thought I knew, and then invested in books for more answers.

And I got them.

I got everything I needed from people who have done what I want to do and set it out right in front of me.

This is the fun part. This is the part where you get those extra secret sauce recipes and start changing your life even more because you maintained a significant interest in your dream instead of just letting it go when you hit a rough patch.

Victories happen in the moments when you make no excuses for yourself.

Victories happen in the moments when you embrace your cluelessness, and search for answers without pause.

When you seek to reinvent yourself, things are going to work. This is part of the fun. Find out what works and make that happen. I always go back to thinking about when I played with LEGOs. I made so many types of buildings that crashed and burned. Some were incredibly innovative but could not be structurally supported the way I built them. Did I just build a boring straight up and down one? Hell no! I figured out how to support the one that just fell.

That’s a life that you can be proud of.

- Evan Sanders

The post My Life, The Moneyball Game appeared first on The Better Man Project.

One Headlight Is Enough

Why not you?

Why can’t you be the next one to “do it.”

To rise from the unknown and to change the world?

Why couldn’t that be you?

Why does it always have to be someone else?

It doesn’t.

It doesn’t have to be someone else.

There are these moments that whisper in my most inner ear that I can be the one if I trust myself and just go for it. There are these flashes of the future that I could build. When I see them, they warm me inside and they affirm me every single time that I am on the right path. They tell me that all I need to do is step on the gas.

And stepping on the gas and shifting into an unknown gear is what I know I have to do.

Nothing is ever given. You have to go out there and take it…you have to earn it. The world doesn’t want you to be different, the world wants you to be just like everyone else because that is the flow of energy that is moving throughout each of us right now. But the little known fact is that the universe will get out of your way when you start paving new ground.

There may be resistance.

But once you decide to create a new way, and lead others, the energy begins to also flow in your direction. That is why there have been a few human beings on this planet who have spread messages so deep and passionately that they have lasted thousands of years. Why couldn’t you be one of those people?

You could.

It’s not arrogance – it’s about asking yourself if there exists a possibility. The answer is always yes. If it has been done before it can be done…and if it hasn’t been done, maybe you are the perfect person to come along and make it happen. Maybe you are the one the world has been waiting for to make a certain thing happen. Maybe that’s you. If the idea is already in your mind…it is you.

The ideas and dreams and goals in our minds…I am convinced were given to us. We may expand on them as time goes on, but these dreams are part of our calling – the thing that truly resonates with us. We must go do that…the thing that allows us to passionately move forward in the face of fear.

I have had fears about starting a serious YouTube video blog for a long time. I have things I want to talk about…I have messages that I want to share from my life and stories I have heard from other peoples lives…and yet it was fear that was holding me back from putting myself out there. I know how negative the YouTube comments can be and how people try to tear others down…but hey, maybe I am the guy to spread the positivity in that place. I mean, I started here, why couldn’t I do it there?

The answer is…you can.

You can do it. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t either.

Give your heart to the world. As Mother Teresa said…you can give the world your best, and it still may not be good enough…but to always give your best anyway.

It’s time I take that advice.

- Evan Sanders

The post One Headlight Is Enough appeared first on The Better Man Project.

Continuing To Walk While Totally Scared

There are these moments during the day, well, at least my days recently, that scare the absolute hell out of me. The only thing keeping me going right now, is continuing to move forward. 

I am 9 weeks into my journey, with 5 more to go, and the weirdest thing about it all is having this moments in my stomach where I just feel fear. This is a good sign in many many ways, but it is new and strange. I take this as a positive sign because when I was living my life way back when…there was no fear. There wasn’t fear of the new things that could be brought into my life – good and bad. There was me, just being me, comfortable in the place where I was.

I wasn’t growing. 

You could probably make the argument that I was actually going backwards. 

Like I said before, the only thing that is keeping me going is the constant focus on moving forward. These goals I have in front of me are not new, but being at a place where I can finally reach out and grab them is. I feel like I am reaching a tipping point, one where I am currently beyond anywhere I have ever been before, and I am just about to takeoff into a place I could have never even dreamed of. 

Watching yourself change daily is fun, hard, exciting, demanding, and every other emotion in the world. You have to take a little bit of time to sit back and look at it all, and then…you have to continue walking. 

There is no doubt in my mind that I will see the final day of this journey and that I will have accomplished what I wanted to…it’s just, scary at times. There’s no reason in the world to stop, which I won’t…I guess all I am really trying to convey here is that courage is not about lacking fear…I think it’s about acting in the face of fear.

I used to think courage was this all powerful moment where you just blast through any obstacle without any other feeling. I now know this isn’t true. Courage really is about making the choice to keep going despite being scared to death. I think it comes from deep within a person to make that choice.

I think it’s important to also remember that you don’t have to do this alone. Your journey is yours…your dream is yours, but you need a supporting cast. Could you imagine if Frodo tried to go to Mordor by himself?! HA! He would have gotten himself killed at least 15 times. His supporting crew, the people who believed in the journey, kept him sane and going towards the end product.

I used to believe that strength was doing everything by yourself. What I ended up realizing is that strength is being able to put everything you can into your dream, and to put a few pieces of the puzzle into the hands of people who believe in you and what you are up to. This is scary! Maybe that’s why I have been a roller coaster the past couple of days. I am reaching a point in my journey where I need to consult people who have made my goal their job…people who know how to produce the results I want…because in all honesty, I have no clue. 

It comes down to trust. 

As you grow older, I think it really becomes harder and harder to just inherently trust people. There are so many examples in your life where you have just gotten absolutely shafted by people that it becomes hard to not be a little bit cynical about things. But putting your faith and trust in someone else gives them the opportunity to really surprise you…and I would rather live my life happily surprised that unpleasantly pissed off all the time.

Be involved in as much of the process as you can, but don’t micromanage people. Remember, they know…you don’t. The day you know as much as they do, that’s when you can have a conversation. 

Forward we go! We shall trek more of the unknown waters and see what lands are ahead! Whatever comes our way, whatever may try to stop us, with the sweat on our brows and the strength in our backs, we shall conquer. 

- Evan Sanders 

The post Continuing To Walk While Totally Scared appeared first on The Better Man Project.

You Open The Door & It’s You

One night right before I was going to bed, I heard a knock.

Hello? Who is there?

“It’s you?”

What?

“It’s you answer the door it’s cold out here.”

What is this some sort of joke?!

“Answer the damn door.”

::door opens::

“Whatsup dude? Long time no see. I like the place! Small but I like it.”

Make yourself at home.

“Look I don’t have much time here because I have to run but I wanted to talk to you really quick. Well, to be honest, I just wanted to show up and surprise you.”

Who…who are you?

“I’m you I thought I told you this already.”

This isn’t real.

“It is my friend. It is. I am you.”

…

“Alright I will explain. I am you behind all the fears, procrastination, and doubts. I am you…the better version of you…the one that runs faster than you currently on the treadmill, lifts harder, focuses more, and reads more than the…you…right now. I mean basically I am awesome.”

So you mean to tell me…you are me…but like version 2.0?

“Lets not kid ourselves here, this has got to be like version 6.0. I mean look at you.”

I see

“I just wanted to show up and remind you of what you are working towards. I can’t really tell you when you will show up again, but hey…I think I might make a habit of seeing this dumb look on your face. Anyways, I wanted to show you the real you…the one that’s not afraid of making decisions and standing by them no matter what. Oh p.s. that video blog you started, well you are not supposed to be really telling you this right now, but it is crushing. Oh and don’t worry about girls, just keep your head down for a while and everything will work itself out. Oh…last thing, don’t take anything personally. Most of the time they don’t really even mean it.”

So…

“Got to go! Things to do. Place to be. Good luck!”

::door opens and then slams shut::

::sits down on couch…::

Woah.

- Evan Sanders

The post You Open The Door & It’s You appeared first on The Better Man Project.

Can You Find The Edge?

The place where you start feeling fear is not the edge. The more and more I go through my journey, the more I realize that the edge is far beyond the feelings of typical fear and worry. No, your edge is something much different. Your edge, a place that is almost never seen, will demand a different type of emotion or feeling altogether.

I don’t know what that is – but I am getting a hunch.

Our minds are like the universe…an ever expanding entity. As you go through daily life, you experience new things and your mind continues to move outward. You give yourself the chance to grow and mature. That is, if you decide to. You can either accept the fact that the world is full of things that you have absolutely no clue of…and learn like crazy and dance in your infinite  cluelessness, or you can go another route. You can let the universe continue to expand around you, and your mind can restrict, contract, tighten and implode.

The world is going to move forward without you…like it or not. Many focus on how harsh this place we live in can be, but I have always understood life as a balancing act. As harsh as it may be, that also means there are unbelievable acts of kindness and love going on. Black implies white.

Those acts don’t make the news. The people who express unconditional love, put positive vibes out into the world, and put others in front of themselves. Those people rarely make it into the news in front of the sex tape stars, the celebrities who cherish confrontation, and the gossip and dirt that flows around the world. But maybe that’s the point? Maybe the fame and fortune is the spotlight that you actually want to ignore when you are moving down the positive path? Maybe, that’s another shadow making you think you want it, but when you get there, it is far from anything you ever imagined.

I will not allow my honesty, dignity, and integrity to be stripped by such things. I would rather walk as a poor man who maintained his integrity than the wealthy one who can’t sleep at night. Not because I don’t want to experience what life has to offer, but if I am going to have everything taken away from me…all my things, all my money, everything…then I will retain the one thing no one can ever strip from me…my positive soul.

In the end, I can build it all back.

I haven’t arrived at this place because of luck. I arrived here because of my love for learning. As time rolls on, it only gets stronger. The thing is though, there were many times where I shut myself off and hid from the reality that I knew…and those were the worst times of my life.

Many can live in a state of numbness…I’ve been there. I’ve been there many times. This doesn’t stop you from “knowing” that there is a different more exciting world out there. You just know you are being safe. You are playing the game right in the middle or even below that bell curve. For any person who has ever dreamed ever…and I would venture to say this is everyone…that is no way to bring buckets of happiness into your life.

So find the edge…or at least leave yourself open to the search.

The post Can You Find The Edge? appeared first on The Better Man Project.