Lesson Eight: Progress in Maintenance

Every stock chart that finishes high or low looks chaotic when you zoom in. My goals feel the same way. If I obsess over yesterday’s metrics, whether the pace on a run, revenue in a side hustle, or word count on this blog, I only see jagged noise. When I step back, I notice the steady tilt upward.

Accepting the Plateau

It took years to admit that maintenance blocks are part of the climb. In my twenties I chased a personal record in every workout. Whenever progress stalled, I doubled the volume, flamed out, and lost weeks of training. More than once, I wished I had simply protected the strength I already owned instead of watching it drain away. The same pattern showed up in my career; a year without promotion felt like a failure, so I piled on projects, burned my team, and did more harm than good. It’s a feeling that I feel so many can relate to. An honest reflection of our past often leaves us stating, “If I just kept doing that, I’d be so much further along.”

Entrepreneur Alex Hormozi says, “The only shortcut in life is being consistent.” Consistency requires showing up during the plateau, not just on peak days. Doing so isn’t always fun; it’s often mundane. Yet those days where you continue the grind not to gain but maintain progress are crucial to the overall trend toward your goal.

Why Maintaining Is Strategic

Fitness: Holding my bench at a certain weight while cutting weight once felt like spinning wheels. Looking back, that stall protected muscle through a fat-loss phase, and I was technically stronger when I quit looking at things with such a narrow mindset.

Career: A year devoted to documenting processes with no real wins looked like lost momentum until those documents led to success in various inspections the following year. The grind without the reward for months was the key to success.

Finances: Practicing restraint leading up to a potential job change allowed for an easier transition without stress from money. Saying no and delaying gratification allowed me to take advantage of an opportunity.

The Hidden Tax of Endless Growth

Hormozi (if you can’t tell by now, I’m a fan) offers another reminder: “Myth: working too much leads to burnout. Reality: not being able to manage emotions leads to burnout.” My worst burnouts arrived when I labeled every sideways week as a failure. The stress of feeling behind triggered the very backslide I feared. Embracing maintenance phases removes that emotional landmine. I recognize that the wins I see online in my social media algorithms only show the high point. People LOVE to celebrate your wins but are often absent to celebrate your progress throughout. The sad thing is we’ve become so conditioned to seeing the mountaintop that when we get there, it often comes with a dissatisfied feeling of, “Wow, that’s it.” The path to the mountaintop is what we’re likely to look back on and recognize as the most rewarding part of any journey.

Tracking the Long Arc

Some of the things I’m starting to implement in my own life to reshape my thoughts behind success and goals are:

1. Quarterly scorecards: I self-reflect on my progress in ninety-day windows so a flat week, or even a flat quarter, no longer wrecks my mood.

2. Rolling averages: I now look at my cycling splits or run pace average over the last five efforts. It’s easier to see your true improvement, maintenance, or even loss of fitness when you look at an average and remove the scrutiny on your best and worst days. Being a second faster each day doesn’t seem like much. However, when you look back at the previous quarter and see improvement in minutes instead of seconds, it reshapes your perspective.

3. Scheduled deloads: This one will hurt those obsessed with Goggins, thinking he breaks his body daily. Hint - he doesn’t; he’s even said so. Deliberate low-intensity weeks turn maintenance into a planned tactic instead of an unwelcome surprise. That’s with fitness and in life. Sometimes, taking less on allows the capacity to take more on in the future. That doesn’t mean stopping all activity and regressing for a month. However, there is real value in recovery. Anyone at the peak of their chosen venture will agree.

4. Celebrate “unchanged” metrics: If sleep, lifts, or savings hold steady during a crunch period, I mark that as a win. Or, if I can maintain fitness or weight during a maintenance period, that’s a huge win. Because I’ve said too many times how I wish I would have just done enough to backslide. I’ve intentionally maintained my weight for around three months while enjoying life and training. The fact that I haven’t changed on the scale is a huge win, allowing me to increase my base strength and fitness.

Long-term goals require patience because compounding is fragile.

Closing Thought

Progress feels less like an escalator and more like a mountain range. I have spent enough time sliding down peaks I climbed too quickly. When the altimeter stops rising, I pitch a tent, guard the elevation, and breathe. Holding the line today keeps me high enough to push again tomorrow. Maintenance is not settling; it protects the trend that will carry me higher in the seasons ahead.

Lesson Seven: Learn to Cook

Some of my richest memories weren’t made on vacations or at big events. They were created in kitchens, around tables, and amidst controlled chaos.

If home had a scent, for me, it would be garlic hitting hot olive oil, tomato sauce simmering on the stove, and meatballs just pulled from the pan, still sizzling. Almost every Sunday, we gathered at my aunt’s house. The cavatelli and meatballs were always there, and so were the people I loved most. The food was the center, but the love was what made it all stick. That, along with the real chance of a wooden spoon flying through the air! Memories that are impossible to forget.

Food Is a Language

Food, done right, does more than feed. It brings people together. My grandfather’s salad dressing, my mom’s pork chops, my dad’s chili, my wife’s soups - each dish held more than flavor. Each was a story, a ritual, a form of love that didn’t need to be spoken.

My grandfather was famous for his salad dressing. I don’t remember the exact details of the story, but someone in the family was gifted his salad dressing recipe, which was written down on a notepad. Finally, we would all know one of the greatest mysteries of the universe! Scribbled down were ingredients and the amount required to unlock perfection. It all seemed fairly straightforward.

At the bottom, one final line: “Flip over.”

The back of the page was blank.

At first, I’m sure there was some frustration. But now, I think everyone loves that blank page more than if we knew every ingredient and amount down to the exact gram. It was the recipe. It was his way of saying, 'You have to feel your way through this, just as I did.’ The mystery of the dressing was the mystery of the man. It’s a story that will live and carry on his legacy as long as we continue to remember.

The Recipe You Never Finish

I’ve added a few dishes of my own to the family’s story. My spicy rigatoni has become a house favorite. Creamy, bold, and comforting, it is often requested.

But my real obsession is pizza.

I’ve spent years chasing the perfect grandma-style pie. I weigh the flour, test the hydration levels, stretch the dough, oil the pan, and bake it on a steel surface. Some days, everything clicks. Other days, it doesn’t. But even the misses are worth it. Because in that pursuit, there’s meaning. There’s a process. There’s peace.

One night, I began writing down the recipe. I listed the ingredients, outlined the steps, and tried to make it as precise as possible. But right before I finished, I realized that words on paper could never encapsulate what it takes to produce my pizza. I had my own “flip over” moment.

The truth is, the real recipe can’t be fully written. It’s passed down in the feel of the dough, the smell of the sauce, and the rhythm of care you bring to the process. It lives in the pauses, the mistakes, the intuition. That’s where the magic hides.

My Daughters Are Watching

My daughters now pull up chairs to the counter. They want to stir, sprinkle cheese, and help me cook. What they’re learning isn’t just how to follow a recipe. They’re learning that food is a way to take care of others, to connect, to show up.

It’s messy. It’s loud. But in the middle of that chaos, there’s clarity. The kitchen is one of the few places where life slows down enough to let you feel the moment, whether it’s cooking breakfast or preparing a late-night feast when someone is craving something.

No one wants to cook spicy rigatoni at midnight. I don't remember how any of those late-night dishes tasted, but I do remember making them with my girls, and I know they remember the same. I hope one day they tell these stories just as I tell the one of my grandpa’s salad dressing.

Why Cooking Matters

Anthony Bourdain once said, “Meals make the society, hold the fabric together.”

He was right.

Food is memory. Food is identity. Food is a connection. So learn to cook - not because you have to, but because it brings us back to what matters. It reminds us of who we are and who we cook for.

And because no good story is complete without something to pass along, here’s one of mine. My grandma-style pizza. Make it, share it, and remember, the real recipe lives on the back of the page.

Grandma-Style Pizza

12x16 Pan (Preferably a Llyods) – Single Pie

From my kitchen to yours.

Ingredients (72-Hour Cold Ferment)

• 405g King Arthur Bread Flour

• 271g Water (68% hydration)

• 1.5g Instant Yeast

• 7g Salt

• 9g Sugar

• 15g Olive Oil

Instructions

1. Mix

Combine flour, water, and sugar. Let rest for 30 minutes (autolyse). Then mix in the yeast. Add salt and olive oil last. Knead by hand for 8–10 minutes, or use a stand mixer. You’ll know it when the dough passes the “window pane” test.

2. Ferment

Transfer dough to a lightly oiled bowl. Cover and leave at room temperature for 2 hours, while performing 2-3 stretch and folds every 30-45 minutes. Then transfer to a 42-degree fridge for 68-70 hours.

3. Pan & Proof

Remove from the refrigerator 3-4 hours before baking. Allow the dough to warm to room temperature. Two hours before baking, oil a 12x16 LloydPans Grandma-Style Pan. Gently stretch the dough to fill the pan. It won’t stretch completely at first, that’s ok! Cover and let it continue to rise for 2 hours. Every half hour or so, continue stretching to fill the pan. If it keeps pulling back, just wait. This is all about feel. Don’t rush it. Trust the process.

4. Parbake

Preheat oven to 500°F for at least one hour with a baking steel on the middle rack. Parbake the dough for 9-10 minutes.

5. Top & Finish Bake

Remove from oven, top with sauce (crushed tomatoes with garlic and salt), mozzarella, and your favorite toppings (pepperoni, ricotta, hot honey—whatever brings joy). Return to the oven and bake for an additional 10–12 minutes, until the edges are crisp and the cheese is bubbling. Hit it with the broiler for a minute or two to your preferred doneness.

6. Rest & Serve

Let cool for 5 minutes. Slice into squares and serve hot.

7. Flip over.

(The rest is up to you.)

Lesson Six: Know Yourself

“It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.”

– Seneca

There’s a phrase that’s been overused to the point of becoming background noise, but it still carries weight if you sit with it long enough: Know thyself.

It sounds simple, like a fortune cookie punchline, but it’s not. Especially not today. In a world where every scroll delivers someone else’s highlight reel, someone else’s six-pack, someone else’s 4 a.m. wake-up call and ultramarathon training schedule, “knowing yourself” feels less like a virtue and more like a liability. Because knowing yourself also means confronting your limits, real or perceived, and that doesn’t make for good content.

I’ve watched the Goggins clips. I’ve admired the discipline, the grind, the sheer inhuman refusal to quit. And part of me wants to chase that. Not the fame or the views, but the edge, the kind of mental toughness that seems to unlock a different plane of living.

But I also know the cost.

I know the days where I’ve pushed too hard and been left more empty than proud. I know the nights where my expectations strangled any sense of satisfaction. When the reps were hit, the work was done, but I still heard the whisper: not enough.

That voice is familiar. And dangerous.

Because chasing the perfect version of yourself, one that eats clean, trains daily, writes deeply, sleeps soundly, builds businesses, leads teams, parents patiently, and never skips a beat, is often another form of self-sabotage. An impossible standard disguised as motivation. And if you’re not careful, you’ll burn every ounce of fuel trying to become someone you were never supposed to be.

The Comparison Trap

There’s also a more subtle danger at play, one that creeps in through the seams of your scrolling: comparison.

We don’t just measure ourselves against greatness anymore. We measure ourselves against illusions. The rented house staged like a dream. The leased car angled just right. The couple smiling for the tenth take of a 15-second reel. We see the highlight and assume it’s the whole movie.

And in doing so, we shrink our own story. We start treating our progress like a disappointment and our pace like a flaw.

But here’s the truth: you don’t know what’s real. You don’t know the debt behind that car or the loneliness behind that vacation. And even if it is all real, it’s not yours, and it never needed to be.

If your self-worth is built on someone else’s projection, it will collapse every time they post a better version of your dream. Knowing yourself means stepping off that carousel entirely. It means living from your values, not someone else’s filtered fantasy.

Effort is Relative. Truth is Personal.

A lot of this clicked for me on a Peloton ride.

Power zone training taught me that we all have different thresholds, and that effort is relative. My Zone 6 might be 350 watts. Someone else’s might be 600. But if we’re both working at our personal limits, we’re both suffering the same. That realization quieted the comparison game. Progress isn’t about catching someone else’s numbers; it’s about being honest with your own. About staying present in your effort instead of distracted by someone else’s metrics. About competing against your previous best self.

Knowing yourself also means knowing where you don’t have an edge and not being afraid to get help. For me, I hired a trainer because I realized the stress of constantly designing workouts and the internal back-and-forth of talking myself out of them was a limiting factor.

It wasn’t about laziness, it was about resource management. I had the discipline to show up, but not always the clarity to plan. That self-awareness didn’t make me weaker. It made me more consistent. More dangerous, even.

You Can Want More Without Hating Where You Are

Here’s what I’m learning, painfully and slowly: You can strive for more without hating where or who you are. You can want growth without rejecting the present version of yourself. You can admire the beasts on your feed and still know that your path, your fight, is valid even if it doesn’t come with a six-figure book deal or a Navy SEAL resume.

This isn’t a call to settle. I hate that word. I never want to stop reaching. But reaching with clarity is different than reaching with delusion. Knowing yourself means knowing the rhythms that work for you. The sacrifices you’re truly willing to make. The ones you’re not. It means asking yourself why you want what you say you want, and whether that desire is rooted in truth or comparison.

“Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”

– Voltaire

Some days, “good” is good enough. And if you stack enough of those days, you might just wake up one morning and realize that the life you built, not the one you borrowed from someone else, is the one worth fighting for.

And that’s not settling.

That’s running your own race, at your own pace.

Lesson Five: Look Beyond the Fingers

“How many do you see?”

In a powerful scene from Patch Adams, Robin Williams’ character sits with Arthur Mendelson, a brilliant man whose mind has frayed at the edges. Arthur holds up four fingers and demands: “How many do you see?” Patch answers plainly: “Four.” Arthur grows agitated. “No, no! Look beyond the fingers!”

It takes a moment, but Patch eventually lets his eyes lose focus, and his fingers double. Four becomes eight. Arthur lights up: “You’re focusing on the problem. If you focus on the problem, you can’t see the solution. Never focus on the problem - look beyond the fingers!”

It sounds like a riddle, but it’s a metaphor we often miss in our own lives.

We fixate on what’s visible. We count what’s wrong. The stress, the weight, the regret, the list of failures. We say “four” because it feels accurate. It is accurate. But it’s also incomplete. Like Patch, we miss what’s just beyond. What’s possible if we shift how we see the world.

What’s Seen vs. What’s True

Most people live reactively, myself included. They interpret their lives through events - what happened, what went wrong, what’s currently hard. But if you stare too long at the circumstances, you miss the context of the situation. You miss the deeper pattern forming behind the noise. The lesson isn’t obvious. The solution isn’t in the stress. As Naval Ravikant says, “Desire is a contract you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want.” We keep chasing fixes to problems we probably shouldn’t be focused on in the first place. It’s a vicious cycle that almost always leaves us hopeless.

When we look beyond the fingers, we start asking better questions:

• What am I not seeing clearly right now?

• Where is my focus creating more friction than freedom?

• Am I staring at a symptom instead of finding the source?

We stop being problem identifiers and start becoming pattern breakers.

Looking Back — and Forward

Honestly, I’ve spent years of my life staring at the problem. I felt like I was behind. Wondering if I’d missed something others had figured out. I used to think the solution was doing more, fixing more, proving more. But now, I realize I was just stuck counting fingers. Obsessing over the obvious and ignoring the real issue: my perspective.

Now, when life feels tight or uncertain, I try to pause. Blur the fear. Step back from the problem. Ask what it’s hiding because most problems are disguises. They’re pointing to growth, if you can see through them.

Final Thought

Vision isn’t just about seeing clearly - it’s about seeing differently.

Don’t obsess over the immediate. Don’t define yourself by the visible. Sometimes, the only way forward is to soften your gaze, blur the edges, and let the deeper meaning come into focus.

It’s not always easy to do. Sometimes, looking beyond the fingers means realizing that the solution you were chasing—whether in your career, fitness, faith, or elsewhere — was never the right move to begin with.

Swallowing the truth that something you were sure would fix everything—something you invested in, believed in, and maybe even built your identity around—turns out to be another distraction—a temporary relief posing as permanent progress.

The future belongs to those who stop counting problems and start spotting possibilities.

Look beyond the fingers.

Lesson Four: The Mountain Is You

“The worst thing that’s ever happened to you is still the worst thing that’s ever happened to you.”

I don’t know who originally said that, but I’ve heard Joe Rogan repeat it at least 100 times—and it’s always stuck with me.

Pain Doesn’t Scale

What shattered me might not even faze someone else. But the mistake I used to make was believing that someone else’s suffering somehow invalidated mine.

Naval Ravikant said, “The enemy of peace of mind is expectations.”

And man, I’ve carried so many expectations of who I should be by now, how strong I should be. But I never gave myself credit for not yet having the chance to become that person.

When life hit hard, I didn’t just endure the pain—I started arguing with it.

This shouldn’t be happening.

I should be past this.

I’m stronger than this.

That voice wasn’t always wrong. But it was never the whole story.

Struggle Is Formative

Not inspirational. Not poetic. Just… necessary.

It carved away parts of me that weren’t built to last. Not because life is meant to be suffering, but because suffering showed me what I could survive.

I was listening to a podcast recently, and Alex Hormozi stated, “You are perfectly designed to get the results you are currently getting.”

That one hit hard, because when I was stuck, I realized I had built the system that kept me there.

My habits. My thoughts. My environment.

They were all doing their job perfectly. Just not the job I wanted them to do.

I didn’t need motivation. I needed a new framework.

I needed to nut the fuck up.

Responsibility Changed Everything

Here’s the truth that finally stuck:

I am where I am because of me.

My decisions. My actions. My inaction.

It wasn’t about blame—it was about agency.

Because if I built this life, even unintentionally… then I could rebuild and reshape it, deliberately.

That realization didn’t make it easier. It made it heavier, because the change felt harder than the pain I’d gotten used to carrying.

But I wasn’t powerless.

I was responsible.

And that responsibility? It wasn’t a burden—it was a gift.

A Message From My Future Self

Sometimes I picture him—my future self.

Watching me.

Sometimes he’s patient.

Sometimes he’s frustrated.

But always, he’s hoping I’ll stop negotiating with my potential and start honoring it.

Looking back, I’ve never regretted giving something my full effort—even if I didn’t get the outcome I hoped for.

I have regretted holding back because I was afraid my best wouldn’t be enough.

That’s when I coasted. Numbed out. Just survived.

But what if I didn’t?

I don’t have to wait until my deathbed to have the proverbial moments of regret.

You and I can reflect now and realize that some moments in life have passed and are gone forever.

What If the Pressure Is the Point?

What if instead of shrinking, I let the pressure mold me into someone worthy of the struggle?

Perspective doesn’t mean pretending everything’s okay.

I

t means realizing that pain isn’t a detour—it’s the way forward.

That today’s frustration might just be tomorrow’s fuel.

When I can see things like that, even the worst things I’ve been through start to feel like stepping stones.

Final Thoughts

I don’t need perfect clarity.

I just need to move.

I don’t need to feel strong.

I just need to act like someone who is.

The rest will come.

So if I’m in it right now… I stay.

I hold the line.

Because there’s hope, not in the absence of struggle, but in how I respond to it.

The mountain I’m climbing isn’t in front of me.

It’s inside me.

Lesson Three: Words Matter

I never used to think much about the things I said in passing.

A quick joke. A frustrated comment. A promise tossed out, knowing I wouldn't follow through.

It was just part of moving through the day, managing everything, getting from one obligation to the next.

But somewhere along the way, I realized something uncomfortable:

The moments I barely remember are the ones they might never forget.

When you're a parent, husband, or mentor, your words hit differently.

With your kids, you're not just talking to another adult who can brush things off or rationalize why you're short-tempered.

You're shaping memories.

You're shaping who they become.

And if I'm not careful, the soundtrack of their childhood won't be the laughter, the adventures, or the encouragement — it'll be the moments when I was careless with my voice.

I think about my kids asking to fish.

Something so small.

A simple request to slow down and share time.

I tell them, "Yeah, we'll go soon."

But sometimes, soon doesn't come.

Work piles up, the weather turns, and life gets in the way.

I act selfishly. I choose me over them.

Then I realize.

They're not just asking to fish.

They're asking if they matter enough for me to carve out time.

Intent doesn't excuse absence.

Good intentions don't leave good memories. Action does.

That realization hits harder than almost anything else right now.

Because when I look back at my own life, the things that hurt the most weren't huge betrayals or loud failures.

It was the small things.

The broken promises.

The moments when someone important to me couldn't — or wouldn't — show up.

The things said in anger.

And I never want to be the reason my kids carry that same hurt.

I heard Bert Kreischer tell a story on 2 Bears 1 Cave about a father who won money in a raffle and was crying. Bert asked what was going on, and the man said that now that he has the money, he can throw a birthday party for his kid and be the dad that his kids think he is.

Not the flawed, stressed-out version.

Not the man weighed down by deadlines, bills, and self-doubt.

But the man they see when they look at him with pure belief.

Their hero.

That story gutted me.

Because that's what I want.

I want to earn how they look at me right now — before life teaches them to expect disappointment.

I want them to remember being chosen, even when the world was pulling me in a hundred different directions.

I want them to remember laughter more than lectures, promises kept more than apologies made, and patience more than temper.

I don't want a bad memory or traumatic event to cloud their picture of me and who I was when, one day, all they have of me are memories.

But that doesn't just happen by wanting it.

It happens by living it.

By catching myself when I'm about to snap.

By saying "yes" and meaning it.

By slowing down when every part of me wants to speed up.

By fishing, even if a dozen "more important" things are waiting.

Words matter.

Because years from now, they won't remember the emails I sent, the deadlines I met, or the nights I stayed late to fix something that seemed urgent.

They'll remember if I made them feel seen.

They'll remember if I kept my promises.

They'll remember if my words were a bridge — not a wall.

And maybe, just maybe, if I keep working at it, I'll get to be the man they already believe I am.

Maybe I won't close my eyes one night 30 years from now, desperate to do anything to go back in time and not break those promises, not say those words, and not fall short of expectations.

Lesson Two: Find your base

Without the right people, you will eventually lose yourself.

I’ve spent a lot of time chasing goals—career, fitness, business, money, becoming “more.” But sometimes in that pursuit, I forget to ask:

Who’s standing beside me while I build this life?

Not behind me.

Not dragging me.

Beside me.

In some sense, I think that’s a natural tension we all wrestle with. Being selfish probably has evolutionary roots tied to survival.

That doesn’t make it right.

Your Environment Is Your Potential

Success isn’t just what you do. It’s who you do it around.

It took me a while to realize this: I could have the best plans, the sharpest skills, and all the ambition in the world—but if I was surrounded by the wrong energy, I stalled out. My progress would get cloudy. My mind would start spinning in doubt.

It wasn’t the goals that were broken.

It was the base.

The right people make you dangerous in the best way.

The wrong people?

They dull your edge—slowly, quietly—until you forget what you’re even fighting for. Until you lose yourself.

Your Base Doesn’t Have to Be Big—It Has to Be Real

Find the people who hold you steady when you’re spinning.

Find the people who will tell you when you’re fucking up.

Find the people who celebrate your wins without secretly resenting them.

We romanticize huge support systems—entourages, mentors, masterminds—but most people who actually win are propped up by just a few. Not always loud. Not always visible. But loyal. Honest. Unshakable.

Sometimes, it’s one person.

For me, that person is my wife.

The One Who Sees You Before You See Yourself

Those words perfectly describe Mandy.

We’ve been together nearly 19 years. She is my person. My base. My forever.

I tried to quit her, but I couldn’t.

When I pissed away my time in high school and left myself with no options, I joined the Marine Corps. With that journey approaching—and no real clue what was coming—I broke up with her.

I told myself I was doing the right thing. That I didn’t want her to have to leave her life. That I was doing her a favor.

But the truth?

I was being selfish.

I didn’t want another failure on my part to be her downfall.

I doubted the decision before I made it. Every second after, I regretted it. Eventually, I called my grandma—someone who had the kind of marriage most people only dream about.

She asked me one simple question I still carry with me:

“Can you live your life without her?”

In the short term, you can convince yourself of anything. I could tell myself I’d be fine. But when I looked forward—five, ten, twenty years—I couldn’t picture a version of my life that didn’t have Mandy in it.

That might sound crazy. I was only 19. And most people didn’t think we’d make it.

But when I asked Mandy to get back together—and eventually to marry me—she said something I’ll never forget:

“My life is whatever it is, as long as it’s with you.”

Read that again.

Someone choosing to live their one life in whatever way it unfolds, as long as it’s alongside you.

I’m not deserving.

But I’m trying to be.

The Base Is the Man

What I’ve come to learn is that being “the man” doesn’t mean standing alone.

It means choosing wisely who you let into your foundation—and honoring them every chance you get.

Mandy is my mirror.

My fire extinguisher.

My hype team.

My sanity.

And because of her, I don’t just chase my goals—I hold them.

Be Careful Who You Let Build With You

Some people hand you bricks. Others chip at your foundation.

Your base matters more than your blueprint.

You can have every tactic in the world, but if the people around you don’t feed your purpose, you will burn out. Or worse, you’ll build a life that looks good on the outside but feels hollow as hell.

If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, find your base.

Before you chase the next goal, pause and look around.

Who’s with you?

Who’s really with you?

Find them.

Thank them.

Build with them.

Because the older I get, the more I realize:

Winning is great.

But winning with someone in your corner? That’s everything.

Lesson One: Saying it out Loud

If you’re reading this, thank you.

For some time, I’ve wanted a place to share my thoughts. If you know me, you might be surprised by that. I’m no stranger to opinionated social posts that get a reaction—sometimes a laugh, sometimes an eye roll. But this? This isn’t that.

Project 35 is something different.

It’s a personal audit. A choice to pull back the curtain and talk about the version of myself I don’t usually share.

And here’s the truth: I struggle with depression.

It doesn’t look like what people expect it to. I’m successful by most metrics—good money, a great family, a comfortable life. I’ve “made it” in ways many people dream about. But that’s the trap: it’s even harder to explain the emptiness inside when your life looks full on the outside. You start to feel guilty for not being happier. And that guilt becomes shame.

But I’ve learned that having everything doesn’t mean you feel everything.

The human condition doesn’t care about your income bracket or zip code. Depression doesn’t ask if you drive a nice car or post pictures of a smiling family. It sits quietly, waiting to convince you you’re alone in it, that you shouldn’t feel this way, that something is wrong with you.

That’s why I’m writing this.

Not because I’ve figured it out.

Not because I want pity.

But because I know that so many people feel the same, and are terrified to say it out loud.

We’re scared to be seen as weak, broken, ungrateful, or “too much.” At least I am. But I’m choosing to believe vulnerability—real, raw, unfiltered truth—is how we connect, and connection is how we heal.

“I think the saddest people always try their hardest to make people happy because they know what it’s like to feel absolutely worthless, and they don’t want anyone else to feel like that.”

—Robin Williams

That quote hit me the first time I read it. Still does.

So this is my attempt to talk about the hard stuff. Not for likes. Not for attention.

But to finally admit that I don’t have it all together—and maybe give someone else the space to do the same.

Here’s the truth:

Being vulnerable isn’t weakness. It’s courage in its rawest form.

In a world where we’re constantly curating highlight reels and hiding behind sarcasm or hustle, being honest— and I mean really honest—feels radical. But vulnerability is what unlocks connection. It’s how we break the illusion that we’re supposed to be perfect or the only ones struggling. It’s how we unite by saying, “I struggle with that as well,” and knowing that we are not alone.

Brené Brown said it best:

“Vulnerability is the birthplace of love, belonging, joy, courage, empathy, and creativity. It is the source of hope, empathy, accountability, and authenticity.”

And it’s not just a quote that looks good on Instagram.

Studies from the University of Houston show that when people are vulnerable and open up emotionally, they feel more connected, build trust, and deepen relationships.

Vulnerability rewires the brain for empathy, resilience, and connection.

The irony?

Most of us are just waiting for someone else to go first.

So I’ll go first.

I’m not perfect.

I get overwhelmed.

I have days where I feel like I’m not enough.

I consume endless amounts of books and podcasts surrounding self-help, and still often feel helpless.

But I also believe in building something better—starting with honesty.

If any of this hits home, I hope it permits you to stop pretending everything’s fine.

To drop the armor.

To speak the truth, whatever that looks like.

Because you’re not alone.

And you were never meant to do it alone, either.

So say it out loud. You may help yourself and someone else in the process.