15,330 days on Earth distilled into one lesson

I think I am officially “too old for this shit”.

Last week I turned 42.

And despite all my best efforts, after all these years circling the sun, I still can’t grow a decent beard.

To add salt to injury, the hair I can’t grow on my face seems to be having no problem sprouting in my ears and on my back.

Fuck me… Life is hard.

And here’s the real kick in the knee:

It only ever gets harder.

With every year that passes my body seems to collect a new nagging injury like it’s on a Pokemon hunt to catch them all…

…the weight of responsibilities and people depending on me only ever expands…

…and the complexity of problems life and business requires me to solve only increases…

But it’s not all bad news.

‘Cause while life seems to be a one-way street where things only ever get more difficult…

There is a saving grace in that YOU are only ever getting better.

(at least, that’s the theory assuming you’re doing it right).

I share all that because last week was my birthday and that seems like a good enough time to stop, reflect, and maybe share the ONE lesson from my 15,330 days on this planet that might help you on your journey.

Not gonna lie…

That’s a lot of pressure.

And the thing is, there’s no guarantee that this one lesson I’m gonna share will actually be helpful…

So let me just cover my bases real quick and offer a piece of advice that will be universally valuable and you won’t feel opening this email was a complete waste of time:

P.S. I can’t take credit for that golden nugget. Watch this once you’re done reading today’s letter if you really want to have your socks blown off.

Alright, enough of other people’s advice…

Here’s what I came to say:

In life (and business), you will spend A LOT of time feeling lost.

Which is just about the worst feeling in the world.

I spent most of my twenties feeling lost.

I couldn’t figure out what I supposed to do in this life, where I wanted to go, or how to get there.

The part that really sucked is that it seemed like I was the only one struggling…

From the outside looking in, everybody else in my life seemed to have it all figured out.

Well, eventually, I got lucky and stumbled onto one of those roadmaps with a star that says “You Are Here”…

And the next decade or so was wonderful because for the first time in my life I felt I had a sense of direction and purpose and (most importantly) the belief that I could actually get to where it was I was trying to go.

But all that was turned on its head about 20 months ago when the $100M business I’d spent the better part of the previous decade building…collapsed.

(watch this if ya haven’t heard that story yet).

I spent months sitting in the rubble of the life I’d built and for the first time in a long, long time I felt deeply and truly… lost.

What followed was a few weeks of wallowing and feeling sorry for myself…

But eventually I sat down with a piece of paper and ran myself through the Escape Velocity Diagnostic.

(this is one of my favorite tools for helping business owners break through the ceilings they can’t even see.)

The premise is simple:

There are actually only three ways you can be lost:

1. You don’t know where you are.
2. You don’t know where you’re going.
3. You don’t know how to bridge the gap between where you are and where you’re going.

All three of these present with the feeling of “being lost”, but the way you solve for each is completely different.

For the first, you need to do a SitRep to clarify where in the world you and Carmen San Diego actually are.

For the second, most people would say you need to sit down and write out your goals, but that’s actually wrong. Before setting any goals, you need to do a ValueCast.

(I onboarded a new student a couple months ago who said this exercise was one of the most eye-opening things he’d ever done.)

For the third, you need an EscapeVector that is a roadmap personalized to your context designed to get you where you’re trying to go.

Listen, the reason I share all this is because after spending 15,330 days on this planet I’ve come to realize that:

The feeling of Fulfillment we all seek is downstream of Clear Progress towards a Meaningful Goal.

If you’re missing any part of that (Clarity, Progress, Meaning, Goal), then it doesn’t matter how much money you make or how big your business grows, you’re not just going to feel lost…

You’re going to feel empty.

And that, my friend, no matter how successful you look from the outside, is the ultimate failure.

Stay Hyperfocused, My Friend
AV

P.S. if you’re a business owner doing at least $20k/month and would like some help bridging the gap between where you are and where you’re trying to go, reply with the word CLARITY and I’ll see if I can help.