What a crazy few weeks it's been with Harvey in Texas and Irma in Florida. Our hearts break for so many who have lost so much.
We feel truly lucky to have the freedom that we do. We got out of Florida for the entire summer and will be in a beautiful little house in the mountains until October.
Of course, it's not always been like this. Before we left Orlando I found a photo of a trade show booth that we built ourselves back when we first started our speaking and training business. Maybe you can
make it out in the photo above, there were no sleek banners or slick graphics. No four color brochures. No, we had wooden shelves and made our own signs and glued our "brochure" to poster board. It wasn't great and truly, it wasn't even good! But that is what taking action is all about. (In case you missed last month's article, please go read it here!)
Why did we face so much certain failure? (Plus I know people snickered at our less than fancy set up.) Why try things with no guarantee of success? It's three words:
nothing to lose.
We had come to the conclusion that we had nothing to lose. But we had everything to gain. Our dream was to have a business. To share our ideas and help people. And the result would be the ultimate goal: having our freedom.
But that's the trick. No one wants to lose what they have. They don't want to lose time (unless it's guaranteed to pay off) or "stuff" (houses, cars, clothes) or hobbies and "fun" like going out, or status - what other people think about them. But as Richard loves to say, "You can't have the life you want without giving up the life you got." And, you can't only get the yeses without hearing a lot of no's.
There is a famous Janis Joplin song that goes, "Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose." Well, we decided that we had nothing to lose. We gave up a lot in process and often looked and
felt ridiculous. But in the end we did get what we wanted. Our freedom. Whatever that looks like to you... we hope you get it too.
