tomurho

[Alex Hormozi @AlexHormozi]

Never let anyone convince you that you are too broken to pursue your dreams.

Dreams do not require perfection, they require courage.

[Chris Williamson @ChrisWillx]

I recently got to speak with someone I’ve been curious about for a long time.

He went through a difficult period many years ago.

Even though he’s beyond it now, he came very close to losing everything.

Financially, reputationally, psychologically,

I asked how he had dealt with the darkest time he’d faced.

He told me that he’d had a concern in the back of his mind.

Throughout his entire life.

He was always worried that deep down, he might be a coward.

That he secretly might not be the strong, capable person he thought he was.

That when the rubber met the road, he wouldn’t be able to stand up and face whatever the world threw at him.

See, many of the challenges we face in life are largely under our control.

We choose the jobs we apply for, the house we try to afford, the partner we seduce, the weight we lift.

These things can still be hard.

Tough, challenging, sometimes unbearably difficult.

But it was us who chose the flavour of that difficulty.

So what happens when absolutely everything comes crashing down?

The single worst possible scenario you can imagine happens.

Well, you get to see what you’re made of.

What you’re genuinely made of.

When all your forces are marshalled to a single challenge.

And he said that he’d had faith in his ultimate self, but he’d never been pushed hard enough to prove that his faith was justified.

“I could always hear my best self clearing his throat in the room next door.”

But he never knew if this self was able to come in when needed.

It turns out, he did.

I love that quote and I love this story because I think many of us are uncertain about just how capable we are.

Maybe a couple times in your life, all hell will break loose.

And your best self will have to stop his coughing, and come say hello.

[DHH @dhh]

You don't have to commit your entire life to optimism, just try it on for a week. Start thinking "what if it all worked out?" and "what a time to be alive!". Then compare your state of mind to the week before filled with pessimism and doomer nonsense.

[Dr. Julie Gurner @drgurner]

Be Aggressive about your life.
It is the only way to get what you want from it...

Nothing comes from the gentle hoping, half-given effort, or the daydreaming of most.

You have to know who you are...
What you want, pursue & reject
Be Aggressive about your life.

[Alan Smith @AlanJLSmith]

This is so good.

Frank Dick on reframing success.

[Jay Alto @theJayAlto]

we all have two deaths and the first happens when we lose our childlike wonder to try new things

[Dr. Julie Gurner @drgurner]

No one is perfect, but if you don't think highly of yourself, you'll ruin your life.

[Brad Stulberg @BStulberg]

Driven people should treat life in seasons instead of trying to balance everything every single day.

Living in seasons means a few years where you focus substantially on your craft, a few years where you commit to a physical challenge, a window when family takes priority by a mile, then maybe another window where you go all-in on work again, a year or two for a big creative project, and so on.

When you look at the highest performing and most satisfied people and zoom in on one moment of their lives they don’t look very balanced at all. But when you zoom out and look across their entire lives, they actually start to appear quite balanced.

Stop thinking about balance as optimizing sleep, family, work, fitness, friends, creativity, and so on every single day. Start thinking about balance in terms of years, or even decades. Think about having different seasons of life for giving your all to different things.

[Tim Denning @Tim_Denning]

I’m in love with this sentence:

You need to be more afraid of wasting your life than embarrassing yourself.

[Morgan Housel @morganhousel]

The Munger formula for career success, as told by @FoundersPodcast:

- Don’t sell anything you wouldn’t buy yourself.

- Don’t work for anyone you don’t respect and admire.

- Work only with people you enjoy.

[Cole Jaczko @colejaczko]

You can’t afford to be scared - this isn’t your practice life

[David Sinclair @davidasinclair]

Eat as though your future self is depending on you. Because it is

[Alex Hormozi @AlexHormozi]

You just have to fucking try.

[Dr. Julie Gurner @drgurner]

"Excellence is beautiful from a distance, and brutal up close." - unknown

Probably one of the best ways to describe the madness & obsession it takes to be truly excellent at anything.

When you know, you know.

[New Mentalities @NewMentalities]

The body is meant for movement and the mind is meant to be still. You feel bad all the time because your body is still and your mind keeps wandering.

[Kevin Dahlstrom @Camp4]

🧪 The Formula

One of my close friends, Tom, was a drug addict. One morning, he woke up to find his girlfriend lying dead next to him.

Since that day 13 years ago, Tom has been clean and sober. He’s built a great life and in November, he’ll marry an amazing woman and start a family.

Three weeks ago, my sister was found dead in her bed. Nobody was surprised. It was the inevitable result of a lifetime of addiction and poor choices.

She and I grew up in the same (toxic) environment, but the outcomes were dramatically different. She’s gone, while I have the best life of anyone I know.

What made the difference?

It's a question I've spent countless hours contemplating. The conclusion I've reached is one that nobody wants to hear.

It’s not genetics or bad breaks. It’s not the economy or which President is in office. Ultimately, your life is shaped by something more fundamental and largely within your control:

Simply choosing to do the right thing. Day after day, year after year.

🧪 The formula for building a great life is deceptively simple (but far from easy):

1) Do things that make your life better.

2) More importantly, *don’t* do things that make your life worse.

Your life is the inevitable result of the choices you make.

It’s easy to justify unhealthy behavior on the margin. One drink, one white lie, one lapse in judgment.

It’s a slippery slope. Exceptions become habits and compounding is exponential, not linear.

A million seemingly insignificant choices make the difference between a great life and literal death. It’s not hyperbole… it happens every day.

But here’s the good news:

The formula works both ways.

If you consistently make good choices, the odds of having a great life are high. Your starting point doesn’t matter. It’s never too late.

Of course tragedy can strike any of us. But my point is:

We have agency. And more control over our lives than we like to admit.

Like my friend Tom, you can wake up one day and decide you want a different life. Hopefully, you do it before tragedy strikes.

It’s your choice.

P.S. If this message resonates with you, would you help me spread it by giving this post a comment, like, and repost?

[New Mentalities @NewMentalities]

You need to be great to win big but to be great you first have to be good and to be good you first have to be bad and to be bad you first have to try. That's the order.

[Jay Alto @theJayAlto]

unapologetic naval screengrab

[Justin Su'a @Justinsua]

There's a moment that happens in almost every serious pursuit, regardless of whether you're in professional sports, a student, an executive, or even at home. It's when the path becomes seemingly too difficult to bear. It's when you realize you underestimated how hard the journey would actually be.

I once spoke with a professional athlete who was in the middle of this exact part of his path. He said things had gotten tough, and he wondered how much longer he was willing to keep going. I would have done him a disservice by trying to help him make the path easier. Instead, I asked a simpler and more direct question: "Are you going to quit?"

He said no.

His answer set the tone for the rest of the conversation. During hard times, once quitting is off the table, complaining stops being useful. It's understandable to be frustrated, but to channel your effort productively, ask yourself: what am I going to do about it?

The Manure Principle
An analogy I like to use during these times is around cow manure. Not a glamorous image, but a useful one. The richer and more nutrient-dense it is, the better crops grow. They thrive because of manure, not in spite of it.

The same logic applies to anything worth building in yourself. Growth as someone pursuing their dreams often runs directly through the stuff that stinks: setbacks, boring repetition, criticism, failure, seasons that don't go your way. That's not a detour from the process. It's the needed, critical part of the process. The struggle you're in right now may turn out to be the very thing that makes you capable of what comes next.

Why the Hard Part Is the Point
If the path were easy, everyone would walk it. The difficulty you're facing isn't a flaw in the system; it's what separates the people who genuinely want something from the people who only like the idea of wanting it. The hardship you're going through functions as a filter. It reveals whether you're truly committed or just hoping for an easier path to getting what you want.

So if you're in a difficult stretch right now, the instruction isn't to escape it or find a shortcut. It's to grow through it. Let the struggle do its work.

The takeaway: When things get hard, the question worth asking isn't "why is this so difficult?" It's "what am I going to do about it?" Everything else is just noise.

[Modern Wisdom @ModernWisdomX]

Failure doesn’t put you back at the beginning.

It gives you valuable experience for the next attempt.

Don’t let the fear of failing stop you from trying.