The Graffiti Machine

Taking action is the best stress reliever I know of.

Sometimes I wake up with a feeling like time isn't just ticking away, it's slamming away. Like the arms of a giant clock; every second the giant arm slams into place with a thunderous sound. The main thing that usually worries me is running out of time before accomplishing my goals.

On these mornings, I take action quickly. As soon as action is being taken—real action—I start fee...

I heard this quote in a Jim Rohn audiobook this morning and it hit me pretty hard:

"An ounce of discipline weighs less than a ton of regret."

On one hand, I write a list of tasks to accomplish and I knock them out. I do this seven days a week. But there's still a part of me that knows I'm leaving things on the table. I'm not a "hustle culture" kind of dude, but I have a lot I want to get done in the short time I have on this planet...

I have a little ritual in the morning. After I walk my dog while carrying a kettlebell, I make a cup of coffee and read while drinking it. A lot of times, my dog interrupts the reading session. She's still hyped up from the walk and gets excited when I sit down. She'll jump on my lap and get pets.

Sometimes I just want to get my reading done, but I have to remind myself that one day I'll miss her interrupting the reading. Nothing i...

In the War of Art by Steven Pressfield, he talks about how we feel the strongest resistance when the task is the most meaningful to our soul's evolution. This shows up as different things like procrastination, fear, doubt, and excuses. This can be both a blessing and a curse.

The curse is it's so hard to make ourselves do the things we want to do when resistance is so strong. The blessing is the resistance can help identify the thi...

We all can find ourselves in a rut from time to time, lacking motivation and having difficulty getting things done. When this happens to me, I try to remember the best way to find motivation is to make progress.

While motivation might pop up from time to time, that isn't reliable. The most reliable way to find motivation is to create it with action. If you feel like you can't get yourself to move forward, just write a list of a few...

I saw a quote today that felt like it would be helpful for people. It said, "don't take criticism from someone you wouldn't ask for advice". In recent years, criticism doesn't really bother me, but when I first got serious about posting content around 2019, it did tend to bother me.

Before posting a video, I would wonder how it would be received and often second guess it. If I had this quote back then, I feel like things would have...

I saw this video the other day. It was a race car driver saying "I'm just gonna put my foot on the floor and I'm not lifting until I see god or the checkered flag". It got me thinking about this kind of all in mentality that can be really difficult to achieve.

How do we get this kind of mindset when the shit we need to do is the last thing we want to do? I'm still trying to crack that code—one thing that might help is to shift our ...

A couple months ago, I woke up with this crazy feeling and thought 'I'm running out of time!'. I must have had some crazy dream or something. The thoughts were about running out of time to accomplish my goals and things of that nature.

At 51 years old, I'm pretty fit and healthy for my age, but you never know how much time you have left regardless of your age. Then I saw a video that changed my perspective. It was an 80 year old ma...

We use the term 'Prioritize and Execute' at the shop all the time. It's from Jocko's Laws of Combat. Find the priority and execute. Once complete, there's a new priority. Then you handle that.

This is the antidote for overwhelm.

It's easy to get bogged down with the big picture of getting everything done. You can't do it all at once. Take a step back to detach. That'll help you find the next step you need to take.

This can be appli...

I was thinking about some concepts that are seemingly at odds with each other, but they aren't. We're only alive today. Yesterday is gone, tomorrow hasn't happened. Living in the present is all there is, but does that mean you can't learn from the past or plan for the future?

No. Let's break it down. How do you use today to make your life better? If you have regrets from the past, you can use today to reflect on them, learn, adjust...

Most people think personality traits—like confidence, patience, or staying calm under pressure—are things you're either born with or not.

But the truth is, you don't have to stay the way you are if you don't want to.

First, you think about the kind of person you want to be.

Then you start doing the things that person would do.

And eventually, you become them.

It doesn't happen by accident.

You train it.

And the repetition is what t...

Being able to build and keep momentum has been huge for me. We all go through phases—on track, off track, fired up, burnt out. That's life.

The hard part is getting back on track when you're off. That's where building momentum comes in. Forget waiting for motivation or inspiration. Just start, even if it's small, and don't sweat the outcome. Consistency beats perfection.

The flywheel effect is real. When you keep pushing, momentum ...

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about energy management—specifically, what feeds our energy and what drains it.

How many times have you had a bad interaction with someone, only to stew over it for hours, days, or even longer? Social media makes this even worse. One negative post can trigger a response, leading to a back-and-forth spiral that eats up time and energy.

But here's the question: How much energy is being wasted in those...

I read the quote 'What's it going to take?' in the book Market Outrageously. It was talking about actually looking deep at a goal and trying to get to the bottom of what it would take to accomplish. Even seemingly impossible goals are worth trying to break down.

In my life and business, I have goals that are overwhelming to think about. When I read this part of the book, I was inspired to actually dig into it much further. Things s...

I heard Alex Hormozi say this, and it stuck with me. When things get hard, most people give up. The idea of consistently getting better in all areas of life is not the norm in society. And in some ways, that's fine—if you're happy with where you're at. But the way I see it, most people aren't happy with staying the same. We want something more for our lives, but pushing ourselves into discomfort is hard. The truth is, doing the har...

We all have those small tasks we avoid—paperwork piling up, a cluttered office, or something simple that feels like a hassle. For me, those things build up in my mind and start to weigh on me. But when I finally take care of them, there's always a sense of relief.

Research shows that unfinished tasks, or "open loops," take up mental space and increase stress. The more we avoid them, the more they quietly drain our energy. Tackling ...

In this episode, we explore the Craftsman Mindset from Cal Newport's So Good They Can't Ignore You. This idea flips the script on "following your passion" and emphasizes mastering skills as the key to meaningful work.

I share a powerful dream that confirmed my dedication to my path, reflect on the challenges of entrepreneurship, and discuss how honing skills—like marketing and leadership—has brought meaning to my work. We also touc...