Paul Angone's Blog

Ultimate Quarter Life Crisis Guide: Signs and Cures for a Quarter-Life Crisis

 

Wondering if you’re going through a quarter life crisis?

Check out this all-too-true list below to see just how “quarter life crisis” your life crisis really is. Then after reading the signs you might be going through a Quarter Life Crisis, check out the cures to help you through your quarter life crisis.

 

25 Signs You’re Going Through a Quarter Life Crisis

1.  You glare at your cat in the morning as you get ready for work and say, “Gosh, I wish I had your life.”

2.  “Am I ever going to feel like myself again?” Is something you ask. Every day.

3.  A Bon Iver or John Mayer song comes on and you start crying. By yourself, or around friends. Or in the middle of a coffeeshop as strangers slowly usher their children away.

4.  “When is life going to feel like it’s supposed to?” Is something you ask. Every day. You thought you’d have your life figured out in your early twenties. Maybe 25 at the latest. Now you’re scrolling through Instagram wondering why all your friends are experiencing the success you were supposed to. Quick bonus secret here from my best-selling book 101 Secrets For Your Twenties: “Life will never feel like it’s supposed to.” 

Because what the heck is “supposed to”? Who holds the blueprint for my life—down to the number of kids, salary, and size of my house? Who decides “supposed to”?

 

“Supposed to” is a lie. A fairy tale. It is the stealer of peace and productivity. It is the leading cause of Obsessive Comparison Dis- order with everyone who “has it better.”

 

No one has it all figured out. No one holds their first child with all the answers. Not many walk right into their passion from the graduation stage. Not everyone gets married like they’re “supposed to” or climbs the corporate ladder full of broken rungs.

 

If we keep trying to live other people’s lives, who is going to live ours?

5.  You’re reading this article right now because you Googled: “Quarter Life Crisis?”

6.  Visualizing yourself 15 years from now doing your boss’s job makes you throw up a little in your mouth.

7.  You’re having arguments with your mom again about cleaning your bathroom and being home at a reasonable hour. (aka you’re sleeping back in your old bedroom)

8.  Your monthly routine of expenses being greater than your income is dawning on you as a serious problem.

9.  Feelings of quarter life crisis stop you through out the day as you ask, “There’s got be more to life than this?”

10. You’ve moved six times in the last four years.

B.  You’ve had six jobs in the last four years.

C.  You’ve had six boyfriends in the last four years.

D.  You’ve had six girlfriends in the last four years.

E.  You’ve had no boyfriends/girlfriends in the last six years and you’re scared your boyfriending or girlfriending is broken.

11.  You’d pay top dollar for a moment of clarity.

12.  You feel like you’re being crushed by either anxiety, unemployment, or just crazy amounts of college debt — you know, like most Millennials these days.

13.  Your part-time, temporary job at Starbucks has lasted three five and ½ years.

14.  You binge on buying brand names to try and cover up that you’re broke.

15.  You find yourself repelled and compelled by church at the same time. You ask God for help one day and then you’re yelling at him the next. Your faith is a roller coaster and you’re pretty sure your seat belt is about to come undone.

16.  You see so clearly the two roads in front of you. A life of comfort and a life of risk. And you’re not sure you have the right car or directions to go down either one.

17.  You surf the internet so much at work every day that you literally hit a point where you don’t know what else to search for.

18.  You laughed, and cried, when you first read 21 Secrets for your 20s.

19.  Making a budget is completely debilitating.

Even thinking about doing your taxes. Debilitating.

Buying groceries. Debilitating.

Doing dishes. Cooking dinner. Looking for a job. Calling your mom back. Calling your best friend back. Picking up the phone at all. DEBILI-FRICKING-TATING.

So you watch four seasons in a row of _________, while Instagram stalking exes and enemies.

20.  The phrase you dread hearing the most at work is, “Congratulations, you’re getting a promotion” because you’re getting pushed deeper into a job you despise.

Feel like you’re going through a quarter life crisis? Take hope. Failure doesn’t ruin your story. Failure helps you write it.” – 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties

21.  You dream about going back and punching your Smug-College-Self who was so sure had all the answers.

22.  You feel like every time you’re a bridesmaid or groomsman, an angel loses it’s wings.

23.  You seek out a mentor for answers one week and you avoid them like the 8th grader with bad BO, the next.

24.  You have no idea where to go for answers. Or even, how to find the right questions.

Yet…

25. You’re 99.7% sure a road trip would fix everything.

7 Cures For Your Quarter Life Crisis

Now that we’ve gone through some of the signs you’re experiencing a Quarter Life Crisis, how do we find help to get through the crisis?

How do we journey through a quarter life crisis and come out the other side alive, kickin’, and ready to thrive?

Here’s some hope and encouragement if you’re venturing through a Quarter-Life Crisis. (If you want to hear me talk more about this, check out my podcast episode “Are You Going Through a Quarter Life Crisis – Signs and Cures”

1. Crisis is Normal

Experiencing crisis in your twenties is like having gas after a steak and cheese burrito. Just because we don’t want to admit it, doesn’t mean we don’t all go through some bad spells.

Even our own parents most likely went through intense questioning and crisis in their twenties. They didn’t just teleport to success and stability. If we ask them what their twenties were like we might find out that as our parents got their stuff together, they went through their own stuff that sounds a lot like yours.

I love what author and teacher Parker Palmer wrote, while in his 60’s, about his own long season of turmoil and distress that started in his twenties:

“When I was young, there were very few elders willing to talk about their darkness; most of them pretended that success was all they had ever known…I thought I had developed a unique and terminal case of failure. I did not realize I had merely embarked on a journey toward joining the human race” – Parker Palmer, Let Your Life Speak

2. It’s More Transition than Quarter Life Crisis

Transitions start with an ending.

Just like a break up with someone you hoped was “The One”, when you’re in major life transitions you’re breaking up with an important season of your life. You’re cutting the anchor that held you in that port, and as it splashes in the water it’s bound to produce some waves.

When you graduate from college, move across the country, leave friends or family – you’re not only leaving that place, familiarities, routines, and memories, but you’re also leaving who you were in that place. You’re saying goodbye to a season and even more dramatically, waving goodbye to who you used to be.

Sure bits and pieces will come with you, but just like that huge, comfortable couch in a bachelor pad, some big things will get left behind.

However, it is stuck smack dab in this void of “what now?” where you make the most progress. Maybe a quarter life crisis is not just a stage to pass over, it’s a transition process to marinate in.

As I write in my new book 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties:

Transitions are not simply a bridge to the next important season of your life. Transitions are the most important seasons of your life.

Let the overwhelming questions of “I have no idea where I’m going” guide you to where you want to be.

(If you want to hear more about thriving through transition and change, check out my podcast episode “How to Make Change and Transition the Most Important Seasons of Your Life”)

3. Limit Obsessive Comparison Disorder

Until we cure our obsessive comparison disorder we will continue to light our internal crisis on fire and then feel the burn. Obsessively comparing yourself to others, becoming more and more frustrated that your _____ doesn’t look like theirs, is the absolute most effective way to take your crisis to unhealthy, eating raw cookie dough with a serving spoon, levels.

Find help for your quarter life crisis with my best-selling book 101 Secrets For Your Twenties. Now with more than 100,000 copies sold! 

“I read this book in the middle of my quarter life crisis and it has helped so much!” – Marie, Amazon Review“Hilarious, moving, and life changing…” – Jordan, Amazon Review

Over 184 224 1,190 5-Star reviews and counting on Amazon, check out what people are saying about 101 Secrets For Your Twenties.

 

4. Kill Unmet Expectations

Maybe it’s time to put to death the unrealistic ideas of how instantly amazing your life should have been before these unmet expectations kill you over and over again.

Success doesn’t happen in a day, it happens in decades. We are in the exact spot we are supposed to be, it just looks nothing like the picture on the front of the brochure. All the time, effort, struggle, and strain that we’re experiencing is not the roadblock to success, it is the stairwell that takes us to the view we were praying for all along.

5. Engage with a Crisis Community

We need to get better at talking through the struggle.

As I write in my new book 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties: 

We’re all struggling. Yet, we’re all struggling to make it appear like we’re not struggling.

Let’s stop putting on the “My Life is Amazing” Magic Show when no one’s in the audience to even watch.

You are not alone in this.

So many twenty-somethings are struggling, we’ve just become proficient at living by the deadly condition of MCDS — My Crap Doesn’t Stink — even when it’s smelling up our entire living room.

6. Don’t Sit and Stew and Simmer

Open up the windows. Let in some fresh air. Go for a run. Heck, maybe sign up for a marathon. Start yoga. Go to a church service. Read some books. Watch a movie every twentysomething should watch. Volunteer at a retirement home.

If you have no idea what you’re doing in your life, just pick something that you know can’t be bad and just run with it.

Sometimes the best answers come when we stop sitting around obsessing over finding them.

7. Ask Yourself Good Questions

There’s nothing more important to getting through a quarter life crisis than the questions we are asking.

Most people let life just happen to them.

They never ask what they really want and how they’re going to get there. So they take that promotion for a job they never wanted in the first place.

They marry the wrong person because they weren’t asking the right questions about their relationship.

They become a one-hit wonder in front of a crowd one day, then the next, the bottom of the stage falls out and they go into hiding.

Again, as I write in my new book 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties: 

Your twenties aren’t about them going as you planned. But how you adapt, change, and grow when they don’t.

If you don’t start with good questions, and keep asking yourself these questions as you are called to adapt and change, how can you formulate any worthwhile answers?

And don’t get me wrong, this process isn’t always easy. It takes grit, honesty, and courage.

But if you’re not asking any strategic questions about what your quarter life crisis is telling you, then how are you going to find any worthwhile answers? 

Thrive Through Your Quarter Life Crisis

Being 20-something can feel like a pug trying to climb a mountain. It’s slow, noisy, and un-pretty, but one tiny step after another and you somehow make it to the top.

Invite others with you on this journey. Ask good questions. And keep warring for hope. Before you know it, your quarter life crisis will be a thing of the past.

I’d love to hear from you in the comments below on what ideas you have for making it through a quarter life crisis. Did you resonate with any of the tips above?

Help cure your quarter life crisis with my book 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties. 

“A life changing book! I love that Paul keeps it real.” – Dani, Amazon Review

“I read this book back in February, and it actually changed a lot in my life.” – Charlotte, Amazon Review

Snag 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties here. 

29 Must-Read Books For Your 20s [UPDATED 2022]

What are the best books to read in your twenties in the year 2022? Here’s the ultimate list for all twenty-year-olds! 

If you’re looking for a graduation gift or Christmas gift for a 21-year-old. Or you just need some ideas for the best books to read in your 20s, well I’ve got THE list for you.

I’m not going to “officially” put my four books on the list, but I am going to thank every one of you as 101 Secrets For Your Twenties now has 945 1,186 Five-Star ratings on Amazon and has sold over 100,000 copies!

Then there’s my follow-up book 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties and my new book that just released March 2, 2021 — 25Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing. 

What are most influential books I read in my twenties? Also what are some of the newest books now in the year 2022 that twenty-year-olds should be reading?

Here are the 29 books that influenced me on this quest for finding the best questions and answers for our 20s.

(If you’re looking for 35 movies every twentysomething needs to watch in their 20s, check out this list)

Countdown of the 29 Must-Read Books in Your Twenties (and Beyond!)

 

1. Man’s Search for Meaning – Victor Frankl – Books to Read in Your 20s

Writing about his survival of concentration camps, Vicktor Frankl’s powerful book shows twentysomethings the power of hope and belief to get us through any situation. This book was an extremely powerful read in my twenties when going through the really hard seasons of my early twenties.

Dr. Frankl creates a powerful lesson in what it looks like and what it means to find purpose and meaning, even in our greatest pain. When we can understand the importance of what we’re going through in the bigger picture of our life, we can better sustain ourselves and thrive in those hard crisis seasons of our twenties and beyond. (Link to Man’s Search for Meaning)

2. Atomic Habits – James Clear

This book is the number one seller on Amazon right now in 2022, so needless to say, people have been resonating with it. If you’re looking to make big changes in your life through habit building practices, this books is for you. (Link to Atomic Habits)

3. Let Your Life Speak – Parker Palmer 

If your grandpa, who just happened to be an incredibly wise, well-spoken educator who is 100% authentic and honest, just took a day and talked you through how to truly find what you love by looking at your life, this would be that book. (Link to Let Your Life Speak)

4. The Alchemist – Paulo Coelho – Books to Read in Your 20s

“Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.” – Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

This is one of those classic fables that captures you with the story and then peppers you with life wisdom on what it means to pursue a dream and find where your treasure is. (Link to The Alchemist)

5. Atlas of the Heart – Brene Brown

Brene Brown churns out best-selling books like it’s her job. Well, I guess it is her job, and she is doing it really well! In her latest book, Dr. Brown helps readers better understand their emotions and feelings to help make more meaningful connections with yourself and others. (Link to Atlas of the Heart)

6. Love Does – Bob Goff

Bob Goff is absolutely one of my favorite people to hear speak in person and he is able to capture that same joy, excitement, and love for life and people in this incredible book. Love Does is incredibly life-giving, joy-filled, while also challenging us to reexamine how we love ourselves and love others. I love what Bob Goff is about and this book will transform your heart.

7. Transitions – William Bridges – Books to Read in Your 20s

Life after college is one of the most significant transitions we will ever go through. William Bridges provides a stellar framework for how to handle transitions and not freak out! (well at least not too much). (Link to Transitions)

8. Amusing Ourselves to Death – Neil Postman

We are obese on information and entertainment – useless facts that are high in fat and sugar, and that require us to do absolutely nothing. This is an incredibly timely and needed book for plugged-in twentysomethings. And it was written in the 1980’s. (Link to Amusing Ourselves to Death)

Read my full review of Amusing Ourselves to Death.

9. Into the Wild – Jon Krakauer  

Into the Wild is a powerful and provocative warning that we need to know, and be known. So much so, that in 101 Secrets For Your Twenties it became Secret #14  — “Don’t go Into the Wild all by yourself.” (Link to Into the Wild)

To find important life answers in your 20s, you need to start with good questions.

Check out 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties.

10. A Million Miles in a Thousand Years – Donald Miller

Encouraging book for twentysomethings looking to take an active role in their own life story. (Link to A Million Miles)

11. The World is Flat – Thomas Friedman – Books to Read in Your 20s

“On such a flat earth, the most important attribute you can have is creative imagination.” – Thomas Friedman.

In the infancy stages of All Groan Up, I did a video review of the World is Flat – full of stop-motion, phrases like “Wii me please“, and the like. If you want to have a 300 page book given to you in three minutes, check it out. (Link to The World is Flat)

12. How to Win Friends and Influence People – Dale Carnegie

It released way back in 1936 and continues to stay a bestseller. There’s a reason for that. It’s one of those classics that stays current. (Link to How to Win Friends)

13. Quiet: The Power of Introverts – Susan Cain – Books to Read in Your 20s

Recommended numerous times in the comments below, it was time this book officially made the list. If you’re an introvert, this book will quickly become your favorite. (Link to Quiet)

14. Wait, How Do I Write This Email? – Danny Rubin

What Danny Rubin has created should be THE required career manual for every college graduate, young professional, savvy professional and basically anyone who communicates. Seriously, it’s jammed-packed with career wisdom and how-to’s. (Link to Wait, How Do I Write This Email?)

15. Defining Decade – Meg Jay – Books to Read in Your 20s

The basic premise – your twenties are not a throw-a-way decade. When her Ted talk came out, I had email after email telling me I needed to check it out. (Link to Defining Decade)

16. Tuesdays with Morrie – Mitch Albom

This book is a beautifully written, powerful reminder on how to live the beginning of our story from someone who has lived well until the very end. I cherished every second of this book like I cherished every second with my own grandfather. Such an important read.  (Link to Tuesdays With Morrie)

17. The Hiding Place – Corrie Tenboom – Books to Read in Your 20s

If life feels difficult right now and you’re struggling to find hope and meaning, please read this book. This one rocked my perspective on the power of being thankful. A true story of two sisters harboring Jewish refugees and struggling to survive Holocaust camp, this book will literally change your life.

I write more about the powerful lessons of The Hiding Place in my new book 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing, under the lie “Nothing good can come out of this.” The powerful lesson of the Ten Boom sisters shows us that our troubles today might actually be saving our lives later. That what we are most complaining about in our twenties, might actually be the exact thing that becomes our life purpose. Especially as we have gone through, and continue to go through all that is COVID, this is an important reminder to us all.

As Corrrie Ten Boom wrote, “Every experience God gives us…is the perfect preparation for the future that only He can see.”(Link to The Hiding Place)

18. Pivot – Jenny Blake

For any mid-twentysomething looking to make a career change, you have to read this book. For any entrepreneur or future solopreneur, you must read this book. An encouraging, insightful read for anyone looking to take their side-hustle to the next level. (Link to Pivot)

19. Blue Ocean Strategy – W. Chan Kim – Books to Read in Your 20s

For anyone who has a deep yearning to create, innovate, and find a way to do your own thing, this business book really blew my mind years ago. The authors talk through strategies, business concepts, and case studies on how you make competition obsolete and create opportunities where none seem to exist. (Link to Blue Ocean Strategy)

20. No Man is an Island – Thomas Merton

Written by a Catholic monk, this book is packed with so much wisdom on spirituality and living life well, that you could sit with this book for a year and just scratch the surface. (Link to No Man is an Island).

21. Linchpin – Seth Godin – Books to Read in Your 20s

Love me some Seth Godin. Really this whole list could just be books from him. Linchpin might be the most encouraging, challenging, and thought-provoking kick-in-the-pants you’ll ever read. Be challenged to take chances, fail, and become indispensable. (Link to Linchpin)

22. Start with Why – Simon Sinek

Simon Sinek blew up with this Tedx Talk and re-enforces in this book the power of starting with your “Why?” A great book for anyone looking to uncover their Signature Sauce. (Link to Start with Why)

23. The Book of Awesome – Neil Pasricha – Books to Read in Your 20s

One. This book is hilarious and insightful.

Two. There was a lot of heartbreak that lead to so much awesome. As author Neil Pasricha described on Huffington Post:

“My best friend took his own life and my wife and I went separate ways. We sold our house, I moved to a tiny apartment, and I tried to get things back on track by talking about one simple, universal little joy every single day — like snow days, bakery air, or watching The Price Is Right when you’re at home sick.”

When life is tough you just have to laugh at the small sweet goodness that weaves through the details. (Link to The Book of Awesome)

24. Capitol Gaines – Chip Gaines

I’m a big Chip Gaines and Fixer Upper fan, so I loved reading the truth and advice from this down-to-earth, wise, relatable and hilarious mentor. (Link to Capitol Gaines)

Find help for your 20s with Paul Angone’s best-selling book 101 Secrets For Your Twenties.

“Hilarious, moving, and life changing…” – Amazon Review

“Really encouraged me during my own quarter life crisis through entertaining narration and crazy honest scenarios.” – Amazon Review

Check out what other twentysomethings are saying about 101 Secrets For Your Twenties.

25. The War of Art – Steven Pressfied – Books to Read in Your 20s

For any twentysomething trying to create something worth creating, this is your battle guide. (Link to The War of Art)

26. Mindset – Carol Dweck 

The difference between a “growth mindset” and a “fixed mindset” might be the biggest difference you can make in your twenties.
(Link to Mindset)

27. Telling the Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy and Fairy Tale – Frederick Buechner

As I struggled with my own faith in my 20s this book was paramount in helping me wrestle with the questions in an authentic and honest way. (Link to Telling the Truth)

28. The Boys in the Boat – Daniel James Brown –  Books to Read in Your 20s

I’d eat inspiring, historical books for breakfast if my budget and body would allow it.

Boys in the Boat is one my newest favorites because it’s packed with so much life-wisdom, specifically for emerging adults struggling to find their place.

Through the true story of Joe Rantz struggling to survive during the Great Depression era and persevering through great odds to make the University of Washington crew team, his story of triumph as his team embarked on a miraculous journey to the Olympics, is definitely a book worth reading. (Link to The Boys in the Boat)

29. Oh, the Places You’ll Go! – Dr. Seuss – Books to Read in Your 20s

Because you’re never too old for Dr. Seuss.  (Link to Oh, the Place You’ll Go!)

I’d love to hear from you within the comments on this article: Do you have any favorite books for 20somethings in the list above? Did I miss some books every 20 year old should read?

If you buy any of these amazing books through the links above, you’re also helping support the work here at All Groan Up as well! Double-win!

The honest truth behind All Groan Up

It’s time I gave you an honest glimpse behind the All Groan Up curtain.

Whether you’ve been reading for years or just joined us here, I’m Paul Angone the author and creator behind All Groan Up. I launched All Groan Up in 2011, almost quit everything in 2012, then published my first book 101 Secrets For Your Twenties in 2013 and went full-time on my own as an author and keynote speaker.

I’d like to share with you, my friends, the good, the bad, the struggles, and the successes of All Groan Up.

I hope the truth in my story will help encourage you, especially if you’re also pursuing a blog, a dream, or anything way bigger than yourself!

Let the tell-all begin.

11 Things You Might Not Know About All Groan UP and Paul Angone

 

1. All Groan Up started as my Master’s Capstone Project

I received a Master’s in Organizational Leadership from Azusa Pacific University and for my final capstone project I created AllGroanUp.com. I’d wanted to create a site like this for years and knew if I had a deadline, and my Master’s diploma depending on it, then I’d be forced to make it happen!

The night before my capstone presentation, I was up until 4 am putting on the finishing touches.

The next day, full of coffee and anxiety, I presented the birth of All Groan Up to a room full of professors, family, and friends. I told them that I wanted to be a voice to and for twenty-somethings. It was very far from the reality of my present, but I was speaking into what I felt was the truth of my future. 

Here’s the video that started it all that I shared to a room full of professors. I can’t believe they let me graduate.

2. I STILL battle bouts of insecurity and fear at times.

Always have.

Since I was a kid, I’ve always been afraid to talk to new people. Going to parties to meet a bunch of new people is as comfortable to me as going sky-diving without a parachute.

So putting out articles every week and baring my soul still feels a tad nerve-wrecking.

Most days I feel like I haven’t strayed too far from my middle school self — insecure about my weight, acne flair-ups, and someone cooler than I making fun of me. I have this sneaking suspicion that our insecurities never fully go away. We just have to become better at shutting insecurity up when it starts whispering its lies.

3. I type with two fingers

Yep. Two fingers. I think in the last seven years I’ve typed around 300,000 words. And every.single.word typed with two fingers. I tried learning how to type like a real professional person, but it just never clicked. I never tell anyone this because it’s embarrassing to be a writer who types with two fingers! But, what the heck. Now you know.

4. I almost quit. Many different times.

There’s been many times I’ve almost quit. I wrote from age 21-29 with little success and a lot of failures. I got rejected by every publisher around. I was working a full-time job in marketing and my wife and I were both beginning to wonder if it was worth it anymore. I’d been writing for twenty-somethings for eight years. When was enough, enough? Some people were reading All Groan Up, but nothing to call home about.

But then a few weeks before quitting I wrote one post 21 Secrets for your 20’s and everything changed. Beautiful people like you shared the article like candy on Halloween. My website crashed numerous times from too much traffic (I didn’t know that could be a thing) and that finally gave me the momentum to land my first book deal for 101 Secrets For Your Twenties. 

5. I wrote 101 Secrets For Your Twenties in a month!

The publisher wanted to get a book out quickly to capitalize on all the momentum so I turned the 21 Secrets For Your Twenties blog post into a full book in one month. That’s a crazy deadline for the publishing world. But I’d been waiting for something to break open for eight years, so I was going to run as fast and far as I could. My wife left with our two kids at the time for almost the whole month, I took every sick day I could, and I just wrote. Now, 101 Secrets For Your Twenties has sold over 100,000 copies. So incredibly thankful and I’m still in disbelief.

Now I have four published books. 101 Secrets For Your Twenties and 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties. All Groan Up: Searching For Self, Faith, and a Freaking Job! (which was pretty much a flop) and my newest book 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing. 

6. All of this started because I felt like such a failure

My passion for starting all of this came because I felt like such a failure in my twenties. As I’ve written about in my books 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties and Thirties and then my newest book 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing, “sometimes our pain and problems are not a distraction away from our purpose. Sometimes it’s the pathway right to it. What we see as our pain now might be our purpose later.” 

So if you’re going through some hard stuff right now, you never know how it will be redeemed in your life and how you will then help redeem it in others.

7. Writing is freaking hard for me

I don’t just whip these posts out in an hour while drinking a Mai-Thai at the beach.  It takes me time, a lot of time, re-reading, re-tweaking, and by the end, my rear-end hurts like I’ve been sitting on a railroad track for two days.

And most of the time writing feels like work. Hard, lonely work! Yes, at the heart, I love it and it means something deeply to me. But it doesn’t mean I’m singing Disney tunes or whistling while I type.

8. My wife edits every word I write

And when she is not free to edit, the article usually runs wild with a few glaring grammar mistakes.

My wife is seriously the brains behind this operation and does not get the credit/accolades she deserves. She’s a former Merryl Lynch financial adviser, but now has the craziest full time job of them all staying at home with our two active girls. To edit my stuff she either has to forgo the only  9 minutes of peace she has in the day or stay up really late.

And she definitely does not shy away from letting me know what she really thinks about something I write! Then I get defensive. And we argue about it. Then I sulk. Then two hours later I usually change it because I know she’s right.

9. I had a blog before All Groan Up called Graduwait.com

And a big thank you to the 21 subscribers who read Graduwait!

Very rarely is the first attempt successful. We have to just go for it, put ourselves out there, and learn. I learned so much during the Graduwait days that even though no one read the darn thing, there’s no way I could be doing what I am doing now without that first “non-failure, failure.”

Here’s a picture of the Graduwait logo. How could this not have been a smashing success?

 

10. For many years I had a day job.

I used to be a marketing specialist at a private university where I strategized marketing plans, creative elements, and was somewhat of a project/client manager. So all my writing for All Groan Up was done in the wee hours of the morning or late at nights.

Here’s what I found is the winning formula to pursuing something bigger:

We work at our job, which feeds us while we work at our dream. Then we keep working at our dream, which feeds us while we work at our job. We do both. At the same time. For years. 

But since 2013 I’ve been a full-time on my own as an author, keynote speaker, and entrepreneur. Now some seasons I’ve spent more time watching our four kids as my wife worked various part-times as well to help keep things afloat. And now we’ve also thrown commercial acting as a family into the mix, which has been a fun, interesting, new adventure.

Being an entrepreneur and having a family is rarely a straight-forward endeavor. I never know what each new day is going to bring, which I love and is a challenge at times. Yet, we try to put the right spokes in the wheel to keep everything turning.

11. I strive for authenticity, humor, and a little inspiration/challenge/oh-my-gosh-is-he-in-my-head, with every article I write.

I strive to be the voice of encouragement, wisdom and laughter to our generation. In everything I do. I hope that carries through. If not, please let me know.

(Bonus 12). Emails and comments I get from you keep me going.

Seriously. It’s the emails and comments from you that motivate me to log into WordPress again and again, and click “New Post.”

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Wait, did I say THANK YOU!

I can’t tell you how much I value hearing from you.

So that’s just a small peak behind the curtain. Enough about me! I’d love it if you shared something about yourself in the comments on this article. There’s some great comments there already! Maybe something you’re embarrassed to tell people (like my two.finger.typing) or maybe just a cool, fun fact about yourself. Don’t be ashamed to brag too. We will sing praises or lament with you here at All Groan Up..

Or if you don’t want to talk about yourself, ask any question you want about me or this site, and I will do my best to answer as soon as I can. I always try to get back to every person.

Love you all! Thank for your support over all these years and giving me the platform to speak truth, hope, and hilariousness into our lives.

7 Biggest Myths About Marriage

Marriage it’s like driving a car. Even if you’re in the front seat, it doesn’t mean you understand what’s going on under the hood.

Most times it’s the unhealthy myths of marriage that has our marriage broken down on the side of the road, sometimes before we even reach the highway.

Whether you’ve been married ten years or you’ve been dating for one-month, it’s crucial we uncover and discuss these myths of marriage that lead to disfunction and disconnection.

If you can de-construct these myths about marriage, it will help you make a wiser choice on whom to marry. And do marriage better once you say “I Do.”

(Also, check out the All Groan Up Podcast episode about the biggest myths of marriage to hear me discuss more)

7 BIGGEST MYTHS OF MARRIAGE

 

Myth #1 – Married People Know What They’re Doing

In my single days, I’d go to a wedding and think, “Wow, there’s two people who have it all figured it out.”

Then I got married and realized pretty quickly that I didn’t have a clue.

For a while, marriage will feel like you’re playing “House”.

There’s no textbook for husband and wife, no matter what new bestselling book tries to convince you otherwise.

Marriage doesn’t just define you, you also define it.

If it feels like you’re playing House, it’s because there should be healthy amounts of exploration, creativity, and unknowns in marriage. That’s normal.

You grow into growing up as your roots grow deeper together.

Marriage doesn’t happen at your wedding. Marriage develops slowly during the thousands of days thereafter.

Anyone can have a great wedding. It takes commitment, character, faithfulness, and humility to make a great marriage.

Myth #2 – Marriage is Work

There’s a lot of “marriage is work” talk being thrown around these days.

Sure, marriage is not simple. But be careful believing marriage is work. This feels to me like marriage is this 8-5 drudgery where every day you’re punching your time card. Because for most of us we can’t wait to leave work.

Metaphors are powerful. Be careful what you’re comparing your marriage to because that very well might dictate your marriage.

You will have to work at elements of your marriage, but marriage is not work. 

Marriage is play. Marriage is an adventure. Marriage is a partnership. Marriage is a creative incubator.

Create marriage metaphors that bring life, not drudgery. Whether your dating or married, what do you want your relationship metaphor to be?

Marriage is the metaphor that you make it. 

Myth #3 – Your Spouse is your Best Friend

Don’t force your spouse to be your best friend.

Yes, I do believe your spouse should be the closest friend you’ve ever had. If friendship isn’t your foundation, when those first waves hit, your relationship’s sexy wall décor will be floating out to sea.

Yet, many of us are determined to make our spouse our best friend, which really means trying to mold and mash our spouse into acting the way we think a best friend should be.

Keep your best friends your best friends.

Make the friendship with your spouse into an elite category of its own. Not solely based on your perspective and previous experience of what a friend should be, but on what works for both of you.

Stop trying to re-print with your partner what you think a best friend looks like and start painting a new picture together.

“Your wife might not tell jokes like your college roommate did. Your husband might not talk for hours into the night like your best friend from home. That’s all right. Like drinking wine or a cup of coffee, they both might taste delicious, but each will have an entirely different flavor.” – 101 Secrets For Your Twenties

Bonus Secret About Marriage: You only get weirder as you get older. If you can’t stand each other’s quirks now, you’ll be sleeping in different rooms later.

Myth #4 – Marriage Completes You

If you’re looking for a relationship to complete you, you will consistently feel very lacking.

Your spouse is not God, magic genie, or unicorn with wish-granting abilities. Your spouse is human.

If you’re putting unrealistic mythical expectations on your relationship, it might end up more Greek tragedy than romantic comedy.

A good relationship should not complete you. No, it should inspire you daily to work on your incompleteness. (click to tweet that)

My wife can’t complete me and I don’t put that heavy expectation on her. But my wife does give me the encouragement and strength to strive to be better. Every day.

My wife gives me complete peace while I continually work on my incompleteness.

Bonus Dating Tip: As I wrote in my book 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties and Thirties – “is the person you’re dating like a magnet trying to bring the best of you to the surface? Or are they trying to bury you under a pile of dirt? A spouse should be like a proficient gold miner, able to go beyond the surface to uncover the invaluable stuff underneath.”

Myth #5 – Whom you choose to marry is the most important choice you’ll ever make.

Choosing your spouse is extremely important. Choosing your spouse every day after the wedding is even more so.

There are so many moments throughout the day when you have a choice to choose your spouse. Or not.

When you have a computer in front of you. When you start flirting with that co-worker. When you just consistently choose to stay at work a little later every night.

Love is more an intentional choice than a tingly feeling. ( click to tweet )

Marriages don’t fall apart because of one big compromise. They fall apart due to a thousand small ones. Like a windshield crack, the longer you drive on without addressing the issue, the more shattered your relationship will become.

Bonus Relationship Question: Do the fights in your relationship have a point? Or are they just jaggedly pointed, jabbing each other over and over in the same tender spot? Stop focusing on the weeds on the surface and start digging up and removing the real problems.

Myth #6 – Marriage is a One-Time Thing

One of my mentors loves saying that he’s been married seven times to the same woman.

I never understood what he meant when I was single. Now, I get it.

Marriage is not static.  It’s not a one-size fits all pair of jeans that will always wear the exact same. Your relationship will change because people change.

In marriage, you have to be willing to re-adjust and re-commit to new seasons. Sometimes that change is screaming in your face (aka a newborn). And sometimes the change is more subtle and nuanced. It could be a promotion, a death, new life, or a new city.

We have to adapt and grow as people, and so do our relationships.

The conditions in your marriage may change, but your commitment should not.

Myth #7 – You Need Affirmation That Your Marriage is on the Right Track

Yes, I do think you need wise mentors in your life who are able to speak life into your marriage.

However, you need to be careful who you’re giving permission to speak into your marriage. Those words can breathe life into your marriage. Or death, depending on who they are coming from.

Your marriage is your marriage.

Be careful who you’re receiving marriage advice from. I’ve met too many jacked up couples who are not even trying to work on their stuff who love giving other people marriage advice.

While it’s great to get input, advice, and wisdom from healthy people, you can’t be constantly measuring your marriage by what other people think about your marriage, even especially from your own family.

Your family is going to have their opinions on how to do marriage, raise kids, have a career – basically anything to do with living.

Be secure enough in your marriage not to run to everyone with your insecurities.

Sure if there’s something really unhealthy going on in your marriage, talk to someone you trust about it.

Yet, choose wisely who you are going to allow to speak into your marriage. If you’re listening to the wrong voices telling you where to turn, your marriage might end up on the side of the road before you even make it out of your honeymoon.

I’d love to hear what you think about these marriage myths within the comments on this article. 

How to Overcome Disappointment

If you’re alive and reading this right now, there’s a good chance you’ve been disappointed about something.

A crappy job. Relationship problems. Sickness. A political election. Or life in general is going nothing like you planned. Pick your poison.

Disappointment loves sneaking up on you — like that weird neighborhood cat who keeps showing up on your porch and peeing all over your decorative pillows.

So the question becomes — how do we deal with the disappointments in our lives?

And I write this having gone through my fair share. You don’t take the path of an entrepreneur without a lot of failures paving your way. Unmet expectations are a daily occurrence.

We can’t avoid disappointment. But when it comes your way will you crush the disappointment or let it crush you?

I say we crush disappointment. But how? Here’s some ideas:

3 Ways to Overcome Disappointment1. Stop tying your identity to the perceived outcome of your work

You never know how a “disappointment” will look in retrospect.

Sometimes what we see as a disappointment now is merely a blessing to be discovered later. (click to tweet that)

Sometimes we’re wrecked with disappointment because we’re tying too much of who we are to what we do.

As I first write in 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties (and Thirties)

You are more than the visible outcome of your work.

And the outcome of your work might be more than what is currently visible.

Do good work. Put your dream out there. Do your best to help others.

Then, let it go. Your dream can’t fly if your identity and self-worth is clinging onto the back of it.”

You are more than what you do. Actually who you’re becoming is more important than what you’re doing.

“We think the outcome is the entire point, when it is just another step on the journey. If we make the whole journey about the predetermined outcome we envisioned, we are destined to be disappointed and disillusioned.” – 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing

2. Have Faith

The more I’m trying to have everything work out exactly how I planned it, in exactly my timing, the more disappointed I’m going to be. I know this. Yet, I still try to grip tight to all the details of my day.

The more faith I have that God is working things out better than I ever could, even if I can’t see it at the moment, the more peace I have.

It’s not a blind faith, it’s a faith seeing with eyes wide open how many times God has come through for me.

If we’re only looking at what we can see, we will miss everything else that is going on.

What you see as a failure now, might save someone else’s life later.

3. Be willing to be adaptable

Sometimes the best plan you can make is to plan to continually make new plans.

“Success in life is not about things going as we planned. But how we adapt, change, and grow when they don’t go as planned.” – 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties (and Thirties) 

It’s hard to be too disappointed in life if you’re willing to adapt your plans when they don’t go exactly as planned.

If you let each failed plan and exploding expectation overwhelm you with disappointment, you won’t be able to move forward very far in life.

It’s only a dead-end if you let it stop you. Or you can climb the wall in front of you and get a better view.

Or as I wrote as Secret #1 in 101 Secrets For Your Twenties,

Sometimes surviving your 20s is nothing more glamorous than just holding on for dear life on the back of an inner tube like a kid being whipped around by a speedboat.

You can’t see a thing.
Repeated waves knock the wind out of you.
Your hands are gripped so tight your fingers begin to cramp. And your only choice of survival is to just let go.

 

 

Bitter or Better? Which one will you choose?

Be better.

Or be bitter.

Those are the two options.

And we face this decision every single day.

Take for example, you’re at the grocery store, with an actual list, buying things like kale and arugula! You’re actually feeling good about life and crushing this whole adulthood thing.

And then you jump into the line at the checkout and start checking out Facebook or Instagram, with the glaring AMAZINGNESS of all your friends buying a new BMW, having a new baby, traveling to Istanbul to take pictures for American Express, and suddenly you want to replace your kale with a box of wine.

Obsessive Comparison Disorder has a way of heightening any discontent to “I only want to drink wine from a box” levels.

 

The Many Layers of Obsessive Comparison Disorder and Bitterness

“Obsessive Comparison Disorder is constantly letting everyone’s “success” smother you like an electric blanket turned up on high in August. It doesn’t work in moderation.” – 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing

We used to have to go to our ten-year reunion to see who’s doing better than whom. Now, we’re trying to fake our success with every post.

“But sometimes we’re not even comparing our successes. We’re comparing our hardships. Not who has it best, but who has it worst. Who has the biggest challenges? Who has the busiest, hardest, craziest circumstances that deserve the highest sympathies (and social media engagement)?

 

Or—and this is a strange one—we’re obsessively comparing ourselves with…ourselves. You start scrolling through your own photos from a few years back. Wow, look at how skinny I was! Look at how many friends I used to have! Look at me when I looked happy! Those shimmering eyes that thought they were going to change the world . . .

 

Or we begin comparing a future image of ourselves that we thought we’d be, against the image we are currently looking at in the mirror. I thought I’d be more successful by now. I thought I’d be married. I thought I’d have my stuff all together. Instead, it feels like my stuff has somehow fallen out of the back of my car and I’m trying to pick it up off the highway as speeding cars barely avoid me.”

– 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing

The Choice. Bitter or Better?

This really comes down to a mindset habit. To practice. To training ourselves to choose celebration instead of cynicism and criticism.

We can celebrate our friends successes and even let it motivate ourselves to do better work.

Or we can critique our friends success and try to pull them down next to us so we feel better about the stuff we’re sitting in.

We can be confident and content in the place God has us. We can create a vision for our lives and work towards making that vision a reality.

Or we can choose to believe that this is as good as it gets. We can become comfortable with living crappily ever after. Then complain about it to everyone who will listen.

When we get rejected. When we fail. When we don’t get the big thing we were hoping for, we can choose to look honestly at our work and find ways to do it better. We can realize that failure or success is just another small step forward.

Or we can blame the failure on everyone else but ourselves. We can internalize failing and start believing that we are a failure.

We can put our phones down and work on our lives. Or we can keep staring at all the lives of others.

We can choose to forgive or we can keep choking on the dry crusts of unforgiveness.

We can trust the process and keep planting seeds.

Or we can keeping digging holes before anything has had a chance to grow.

Your Future Depends on This

Bitter or better?

Create or complain?

Which one will you choose? Your future work and peace in life depends on this.

The more we move into what we were made to do the less we worry about replicating what someone else was made to do.

This post is adapted from my new book 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing

I’d love to hear your thoughts below in the comments on whether you struggle with this or not.

 

 

MisInformation – 4 Strategies to Guard Against It

 

We have an overabundance of information today.

But do we have an overabundance of wisdom — gleaning rich information and applying it in the right way at the right time?

If the answer feels like a no, which it does to me, why is that the case?

What’s the main source of our information today and through what medium? Well, for most of us, it’s our phone, right?

Information cascading to us through the internet. But there’s just too much. So it’s condensed for us by what’s trending, what’s hot, what people are sharing on social media and the “filter bubbles” that have been created for us.

Information has become algorithms catered to appease us and keep us endlessly clicking throughout our day, all day, every day.

In an article by Trevor Haynes and Rebecca Clements for Harvard, they state that “adults in the US spend an average of 2–4 hours per day tapping, typing, and swiping on their devices—that adds up to over 2,600 daily touches.”

2,600 daily touches!! 

“I feel tremendous guilt,” said Chamath Palihapitiya, former VP of User Growth at Facebook to an audience of Stanford students:

“The short-term, dopamine- driven feedback loops that we have created are destroying how society works. No civil discourse, no cooperation, misinformation, mistruth and it’s not an American problem. This is a global problem. It is eroding the core foundations of how people behave by and between each other.”

What do we do? How do we not just find information, but the right information? How do we escape mistruth and misinformation? How do we find wisdom? Here’s some ideas.

4 Strategies to Being Wisely InformedRead Good Books

I’m an author of four books, so of course I’m going to start here! Yet, this has been a quality answer for being a more well-informed person since Gutenberg was spinning the wheels on that first printing press.

There are so many good books out there. Not sure where to start? Check out my article on the 27 Must-Read Books for Your Twenties (and far beyond). These books were the most influential to me in my twenties, like Man’s Search for Meaning, Let Your Life Speak, and War of Art.

I also love reading history books because it gives me a context and understanding for where we’ve been and what we’re going through today. There’s so much talk on Twitter every day about how this is the worst things have ever been. Then you read a little history, and realize, no, no it’s not. Every generation has pretty much thought the same thing at times.

2. Meet with People Smarter Than You

For thousands of years, this was the main way information was shared. Through conversations, through mentors, through apprenticeships.

If you didn’t know how to do something, you asked your elders. Now we just ask Google.

We’ve lost the art of asking good questions and listening.

The difference is we ask Google a question based on what we think we already know and it tells us what it knows we want to hear. Or you ask someone smarter than you and they will tell you stuff you didn’t even know that you didn’t know.

It’s information that is nuanced and important.

3. Limit the Negative Noise, Harness the Good

If you’re sick of your main source of information being all the negative or unimportant headlines that are trending on Twitter, try a new source.

One current news source option that I’ve come to enjoy is The Pour Over. It’s a quick, curated news update sent to you of what’s going on in the world, but shared also from a faith perspective. So there’s uplifting commentary and context amidst today’s headlines. I’ve been enjoying staying up-to-date this way. Have you tried The Pour Over or do you have other alternative news outlets you enjoy? I’d love to hear about them in the comments below.

4. Be Okay with Silence

Sometimes the best source of information is not taking in any information at all.

Silence speaks to your well-being, not your well-doing.

Sometimes you just need to refresh yourself before you wreck yourself. 

Or as I write in 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing:

“Don’t fill yourself with your feed. We used to live annoyed by distractions. Now, too often, we live for them.

Your soul has a lot to tell you if you will listen to it.

The details of your day have a lot to speak to you if you will pay attention to them.

Maybe we’re not having any breakthrough ideas in our lives because we’re not giving ourselves any space to think.  ” 

– 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing

What do you think?

Do you think we’re thinking on our own? Or are we letting social media and the Internet do the thinking for us?

Do you have other strategies or ideas for taking in the right kind of information? Share your thoughts below and let’s talk about this.

 

This post was adapted from 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing

 

5 Strategies for Overcoming Fear and Anxiety in 2021

It sure seems like fear and anxiety have ruled the day, hasn’t it?

These two have been the King and Queen of the past year and I for one am ready to break free from their oppressive rule.

Fear and anxiety breed hopelessness. At least it does for me.

Anxiety is like black mold – it springs up in soggy conditions. Spreads uncontrollably. And often times we don’t realize it’s there until it’s literally killing us.

Let’s fight back against all this fear and anxiety. Here’s how.

 

5 Strategies for Overcoming Fear and Anxiety in 2021

 

DEFINE YOUR ANXIETY

Too many of us are living under this constant, low-grade anxiety — that’s ready to spike to “call the doctor” levels in a matter of moments.

How many times in a day are you anxious, yet you’re not exactly sure what you’re anxious about? It’s there. It’s real. You feel it. But you have no idea the source.

That’s why a really helpful exercise is to stop and define your anxiety. Figure out the source. Was it the headline you just read on your phone or email? Was it the fleeting thought of the phone call you need to make, but you’re avoiding? Was it the thought about your boss or boyfriend? Or is it just the overall “joyous” state of the world and all the fun stuff it throws at us every day?

Where did the anxiety come from? The first step to overcoming anxiety is working on defining what exactly it is.

2. CUT OFF ANXIETY SOURCES

Growing up, I was allergic to dairy. Like really allergic.

My throat would swell, my ears would feel like they were going to burst, and I felt like I had swallowed sand paper. It was terrible. This was before all these amazing non-dairy options were available, so as a kid this meant no ice cream. No cheese. No pizza. Basically, no fun.

There were a few times where I thought I was over my allergies or frankly, I just wanted that bite of chocolate ice cream at the birthday party so bad, that I would dive into dairy, head-first. But the pain that followed was never worth it.

I share this story because I feel many of us operate the same way with our sources of anxiety. We know the source of our anxiety, yet we keep taking big drinks from it throughout our day, even though we know it’s going to make us feel sick.

Take our iPhones and social media for example. All the headlines. All the updates. All the noise. It’s all this HUGE SOURCE OF ANXIETY for many of us. Yet, we keep taking another long drink. All day long. We keep making ourselves sick. Why?

In my new upcoming book 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing, I call our unhealthy addiction to our smart phones our “Obsessive Connection Disorder”.

“We check the phone not as much for entertainment as for escape. A numbing of sorts. A distraction from the distraction of all the distractions. And, most times, we don’t choose to do it. We don’t even want to do it. We are compelled to do it….Like smoking another cigarette, we swear we will stop and get it under control. But just after this next one.” – 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing

We must think long and hard about our addiction to our phones and what it’s doing to us. We must replace this constant need to escape into our phones, which only increases our anxiety rather than diminishes it. Hear me talk more in-depth about this on the brand new All Groan Up Podcast with the episode on Obsessive Connection Disorder.

3. DO SOMETHING

Sounds over-simplified, but really it works and it’s important.

I call it GET ACTION, stemming from former US President Theodore Roosevelt. The man accomplished more in his lifetime than 500 men combined. The motivation behind much of what he accomplished stemmed simply from him combating his depression and anxiety. He didn’t dwell too long on his anxiety, he got up and did things, which made him feel less anxious.

“Get action. Do things; be sane; don’t fritter away your time; create, act, take a place wherever you are and be somebody; get action.” – Teddy Roosevelt 

Instead of feeling those flutters of anxiety and fear, then escaping into your phone which only brings that flutter to a full-fledged pounding. Instead, GET ACTION. Read a book. Make a meal. Go on a walk. Play with your kids. Pray. Meditate. Work on that project that gives you energy. Focus on getting something done. GET ACTION.

My wife can attest that I’ve become the king of the outdoor yard GET ACTION home project. Maybe you’ve even seen me post pictures of a few of those projects on my Instagram? Like here, here, AND here. (See, I wasn’t lying)

GET ACTION brings me life. Accomplishing something that you can see and touch is important for your soul. 

4. MAKE A “WOW, I’M BLESSED” LIST

“Most folks are as happy as they have made up their minds to be.” – Abraham Lincoln

How many times have you come up against something that you thought, “There’s no way I’m getting out of this.”

And then out of nowhere, the answer, the open door, the finances, the wisdom you needed arrives and everything works out better than you could’ve dreamed.

Your fears are typically worse than the thing you’re afraid of.

We’ve been blessed so many times, so why do we continually keep expecting the opposite?

Making a list of times or ways you’ve been blessed is a great way to keep perspective when times get tough again.

If you keep worrying that you’re in deep crap, that’s exactly how you’re going to feel.

5. DON’T BE AFRAID OF SILENCE

“Oh my, this is a noisy world.” —Mr. (Fred) Rogers

Many of us are afraid of silence. So we fill it with noise as fast as we can.

As I write in 25 Lies Twentysomethings Need to Stop Believing:

“Why are we surprised that we have a scarcity of clarity? How can we expect to have any peace in our lives when we constantly keep inviting all the angst of the world to our home that constantly shouts at us everything that is going wrong?” – 25 Lies

You see, most of the world doesn’t want you to have any silence. Because if you’re in silence, the world can’t sell you anything there.

No politician, business, advertisement, or sometimes even pastors and authors want you to have silence. Because then you will not be listening to their answers for all your problems.

When sometimes our BIGGEST problem is coming from those who keep shouting at us all the answers.

So right now, I encourage you to rest and be silent. There’s a peace and a knowing waiting there for you.

Let’s begin to work on these daily habits to invite peace into our homes instead of dread.

Dear Class of 2020 – For such a time as this…

Watch my impromptu graduation speech from my garage! In this crazy time, it seemed like the perfect time and place.

For any 2020 college grad or just anyone who could use some encouragement and inspiration, below is an inspirational four-minute garage graduation speech.

Graduation Speech Highlights

1. Nothing has gone as you planned. That’s ok. Success in life is not about things going as you planned but how you adapt, change, and grow when it doesn’t. We’re all getting a crash course in that.

2. Don’t let fear win. Don’t let the headlines become your headline.

3. War for Hope!

4. This is an amazing time in history to make history. This is an amazing opportunity to create answers to all the problems.

5. If you’re struggling, don’t struggle to make it appear like you’re not struggling. You’re not alone.

Dear Class of 2020. You will go down in history so don’t be afraid and make history. Choose hope over fear.

Make your headline be what you want it to be.

Find Help and Hope in the Struggle

There’s a lot of struggle going on right now.

As we all swim through the new (ab)normals of this COVID-19 reality, it’s easy to feel like the struggle is all there is. Yet, here’s the hope and the help found in the struggle.

The Most Dangerous Struggle of All 

First, let’s start with the movie 127 Hours. Have you seen it?

It’s an intense movie. A tough watch.

And it contains one of the most poignant messages and warnings for all of us that we need to take to heart. Especially in this intense coronavirus season of life.

If you haven’t seen the movie, it stars James Franco, who does an incredible job portraying real-life mountain climber Aron Ralston and his harrowing account of falling down a canyon in remote Utah only to have a boulder land on his arm, preventing any escape.

Ralston is stuck.

And as the intensity and enormity of the situation begins to set in, he realizes a cold, hard truth:

I never told anyone where I was going.

No one would know where to look.

No one would be coming to his rescue.

He was utterly alone because he lived his life like he never needed anyone.

We don’t need to be mountain climbers like Aron Ralston to heed this warning.

The Biggest Struggle of Them All

There is a danger in going at anything completely alone. Even when it feels like we’re stuck in isolation.

We’re all struggling. Yet, too many of us are struggling to make it look like we’re not struggling. (click to tweet that)

We need to tell people where we are going and where we have been. And the remedy is something simple, yet extremely difficult: vulnerability.

Me Being Vulnerable

I’ve definitely had my ups and downs this last month.

Fear and peace, anxiety and assurance, all in a cage match together for dominance over my heart. Plus, I’ve been wrestling with a sickness for over a few months now. It’s wild to think its been that long.

Yet, this week my chest decided to increase in tightness and my congestion worsened. So I’ve definitely placed a few worried calls to the doctors wondering if the worst has taken hold. They don’t what it is but they don’t think it’s in my lungs, so that’s good at least!

Does my chest feel like its being squeezed by an iron fist because of a virus or because of fear? Do I choose faith or do I choose fear?

Yesterday, I just couldn’t take any of it anymore. The headlines. The exhaustion. The frustration. The sickness. So I turned my phone off. Laid in bed. Grabbed a book. Put a heating pad on. Took a nap. Prayed. Took a bath. And just tried to get better for eight hours.

I don’t like not helping. I don’t like not being active. Plus, with four kids in the house, eight hours is an eternity for the other spouse trying to keep everything from burning down during self quarantine.

Yet, I just didn’t have anything left to give. I kind of had to give up. At least for a few hours. Thankfully my awesome wife Naomi held the fort down while I did.

Why am I telling you all this?

If I sing about the need for all of us to be authentic and vulnerable, while I inauthentically hide behind each piece of advice and the exciting parts of my journey, then I’m just another clanging symbol amidst a cacophony of unnecessary noise.

We don’t connect with each other through our pretend perfection. We connect over our shared struggle. (click here to tweet that)

Authenticity starts with each one of us. We have to be brave enough to go first.

It takes a lot of courage to talk about where you lack the most courage.

We have to be courageous enough to open the doors and let others really see inside. In this season of isolation we have to be intentional about letting others know where we are. And what’s going on.

And honestly, if I can just get really real with you right now.

I wouldn’t be able to handle any of this if I didn’t truly believe and know that God is here with me in all my questions, imperfections, insecurities, and fears. If I didn’t sense in my spirit Him saying, “Relax. We’re in this together,” I would be an inoperable mess.

I can’t do surgery on myself. Or at least, I don’t want to try.

So here’s a piece of my struggle for you to see inside. To hopefully encourage you in yours.

Whether you feel like you’re failing. You feel all alone. You’re smack dab in the middle of a quarter-life crisis, losing inspiration or hope, or you just can’t seem to feel normal again in this coronavirus abnormal.

We’re not supposed to ease the angst by pretending like it’s not there. This is hard and we can’t do it alone.

There are answers in the angst if we’re willing to vulnerably sit in it and ask the hard questions.

I don’t have it all figured out, but I know I’m not supposed to.

But I do know that this too shall pass. We will get through this.

There is hope and purpose found on the other side of struggle. 

But in the meantime, if you’re struggling with something, talk to someone about it. Lets not struggle to make it appear like we’re not struggling.

Share the struggle.

So that if the rock falls on your arm, or your chest, you’ll have someone there to help you get it off.

Part of this post is an adapted excerpt from my new book 101 Questions You Need to Ask in Your Twenties (and let’s be honest, your thirties too)