Thank you friends for being on this adventure with me of 100 episodes of Work Life Play. At the end of this episode, I have a special closing from my friend Jack O'Neill from Jackopierce. My wife and I spent the weekend with them in NYC as part of attending a Seth Godin conference. Our new friends Ryan and Heidi Miller joined us to make six.

Check out their work:

Ryan's work 08Left Custom art for Travelers and Lovers of Aviation. 

Heidi's custom card company Mango Ink

Jack's music with Jackopierce

Andrew Reiner is a writer and educator in Baltimore, MD. He is working on a book about masculinity and, right now, a chapter on boys/men and crying.

He read a blog by my friend Sam Jolman, How to Cry Like a Man, while researching this topic and he read a comment I made on how I did not cry between the ages of 12-21. 

This episode is about becoming wholehearted and emotionally fit as men. "Embracing the full spectrum of our life". 

Dean Karnazes exudes life...to the fullest. At age 30, Dean discovered his feet were meant for running unimaginable distances instead of his former wing tipped polished leather shoes of Corporate America. Dean won't taunt you with his stories of his expanding the boundaries of human potential. Instead, Constantine Dean Karnazes (Dean's actual real name) will ask you this trite question in a piercing new way, "Are you happy?" 

I S O L A T I O N is a short film directed by David Guersan and Mathieu Bernat about a stranger leaving his modern lifestyle for a spiritual journey through incredible Scottish landscapes. Throughout the film, the stranger works to uncover the meaning of solitude and isolation. The piece was shot while traveling for two weeks in a leaky van through remote parts of Scotland. Thanks to my friend Britt Jones for the recommendation on watching this short film.

Author, speaker, and leader Eric Eaton shows readers a pathway to bust their limitation, define success for themselves, and live an abundant life. Eric distilled decades of personal and professional lessons into a proven plan to alleviate guilt and frustration in achieving their goals.

It's easy to believe that if we lived somewhere else, worked somewhere else, were with someone else....we could experience the life we desire. Most of the time...that turns out to be entirely wrong. 

Change -lasting change, starts from within us. We see with our eyes what we believe we will see from our wholehearted life. Maybe...the life we want starts in the geography we are right now?

Jake Norton is a world-renowned climber, photographer, filmmaker, philanthropist, and inspirational speaker. Based in Evergreen, Colorado, Jake’s worldwide adventures have taken him to the summit of Mount Everest (three times) and on expeditions on all seven continents.

Discovering, restoring and recovering balance requires being honest about and accepting your limitations. I did not want to believe that I had physical, emotional and relational limitations. Unfortunately, despite my disbelief, my thresholds of energy stopped me in my tracks. I had ignored my stamina limitations for so many years until I found myself depleted and on the sidelines of life.

In this podcast, I offer my personal experiences of accepting my thresholds and limitations. I always feared that if I heeded the idea that I had limitations, it somehow seemed like giving up.  Today, operating within my capacity I can live, work, play and love in a sustainable way.

Dan Roam is the author of the international bestseller The Back of the Napkin, the most popular visual-thinking business book of all time. Dan helps business people think and solve problems visually. His newest book, Draw to Win distills ten years of working with business professionals from Microsoft, IBM, The White House, Google, Lucas Films....and a bunch of others.

Build in MicroRest into your day. Begin choosing to pause, for a moment, a second or a few minutes. Stop, come to an idle and catch your breath.

Practical MicroRest habits

Work: Schedule five to fifteen minute meeting blocks on your calendar. Title the meeting “Planning” or “Strategy”. Be proactive by building in moments in your work day that enable you to rest, pause and catch your breath.

Power naps: Take ten to thirty minutes to rest. Turn off your cell phone. Turn on a timer. Put in your headphones and listen to something tranquil. Quiet your mind or fall asleep. Do what’s good for you.

Pause on your block: After work, before walking in the door to your family, pull over on your street and pause. Remind yourself of your love and gratitude for your family. Honor the realities of your day, but transition away from your work day and into your family life.

Stop Multitasking and starting doing one thing at a time. In this episode, I outline how multitasking deters us from experiencing balance. Instead, focusing our energy and attention on one task, conversation, meeting, email, or project at a time increases our productivity.

Why Multitasking doesn't work

Money
Why you should start Singletasking. Multitasking makes us 40% less productive.
Read More

Fast Company
Multitasking rewires our brain and stunts our emotional intelligence.
Read More.

Forbes
Multitasking doesn't work. The truth is we are wasting time. Our brains aren't equipped to Multitask.
Read more

I've found that closing the gap between where I am today and Where I want to be usually isn't accomplished with one magic lever switch or dial adjustment. Instead, it is a series of small adjustments made regularly over time that slowly reconditions our choices and habits to alter our future.

Restoring Balance in our Work, Life, Play, Health and Relationships isn't easy. We individually maintain our own definition of what balance means to us. Start where you are and begin making adjustments to recovering balance. Start by doing one thing at a time-Stop Multitasking.

In this podcast series on Restoring Balance, I deconstructs the art of making adjustments in your approach, your thinking, your beliefs and habits. I share practical easy-to-start tools to restoring balance to your Work, Life, Play, Health and Relationships. Part 1-Changing Your Atmosphere starts with changing how we approach our circumstances by changing our internals.

Andrew Skurka is an accomplished adventure athlete, speaker, guide, and writer. The 34-year-old is most well known for his solo long-distance backpacking trips, notably the 4,700-mile 6-month Alaska-Yukon Expedition, the 6,875-mile 7-month Great Western Loop, and the 7,775-mile 11-month Sea-to-Sea Route.

Andrew spends most of his adventures off trail picking his way through the high mountains. I really enjoyed my time meeting Andrew. I found him to be very kind, humble, relatable and focused.

What's Andrew's #1 piece of advice?

"GO"

Andrew's Media Highlights & Accolades

National Geographic, March 2011. Circling Alaska in 176 Days.

Outside, April 2011. Adventurers of the Year.

National Geographic Adventure, December 2007. Adventurer of the Year.

Backpacker, August 2005. Person of the Year.

Men’s Journal, December 2005. Adventurer Hall of Fame.

Five years ago I started writing a couple articles on a wordpress site to profile my ideas as part of a career change.

Accidentally….Now two-hundred and forty field reports (blog posts) and 86 podcast episodes later on Work Life Play….I can confidently say I’m onto something. This podcast is a milestone marker to this five year journey and the lesson's I've learned.

Thanks for your friendship, your love, your encouragement, your comments, your shares and rooting me forward.

Here’s my summary as best I can articulate it today.

Learn how to restore balance in your life.
Create a life that matters to you.
The narrative we tell ourselves frames our life.
Work can’t be about survival.
Life can’t be entirely about work.
Rethink work.
Live differently.
Capitalize on the small margins of your life, they add up.
Stay curious.
Live adventurously.
Learn to play.
Love the people that you’re with.

Create a life that matters to you.
The narrative we tell ourselves frames our life.
Work can’t be about survival.
Rethink work.
Live differently.
Capitalize on the small margins of your life, they add up.
Stay curious.
Live adventurously.
Learn to play.
Love the people that you’re with.

Five years later, I know I’m onto something.

Quantifiable Proof

Meet Bill Burnett and Dave Evans, co-authors of the Stanford course turned book providing a methodology to Designing Your Life: How to build a well-lived, joyful life. Our conversation provided me a meaningful crescendo to my two hundred and forty field reports here on Work Life Play. This book is new quantifiable proof to my work.

• Everbody gets stuck, start where you are
• Learn how problem solving used in product design can be applied to designing your life
• The idea of Work-Life balance is totally wrong and approaches the problem with a win-lose outcome
• Understand why your life needs a dashboard in five categories: Work, Life, Play, and Health & Love
• Dysfunctional beliefs require Reframed Thinking in order to Design Your Life 
• You're never too late to Design Your Life

Last week, I crashed a women only backyard dinner party. Thirty women were dressed and buttoned to celebrate their Season Finale of Super Soul Happy Hour/Share Classes. Party lights were strung between Ponderosa pines and simple picnic tables borrowed from the local high school. Each place setting held a Martha Stewart style full bouquet of food and wine. Elayne Prechtel envisioned this backyard soiree of Sharing our Life, Love & Food and created an enchanted Colorado summer evening for her friends. 

Srini called in for our interview from a SoCal seaside coffee shop between tides. He ejected on his busy life to detox for a few days by practicing what he preaches. During our interview you'll hear trains pass by, seagulls cawing and Srini get fired up about why becoming UNMISTAKABLE eliminates any notion of competitors.

Over a quick beer in downtown Portland, I met Srini in 2013 at Chris Guillebeau's World Domination Summit. He just released his first book, UNMISTAKABLE: Why Only Is Better Than Best. You've probably listened to one of his near 700 episodes of his popular podcast The Unmistakable Creative. He interviews everyone from an FBI hostage negotiator to some of my favorites Bob Goff, Rob Bell, Tim Ferris and Seth Godin.

In this podcast he talks about his love for surfing and the metaphors for life he discovered between sets of waves. We chat about how UNMISTAKABLE uses the stages of surfing as the framework for his becoming Unmistakable.

Podcast Highlights:

• Srini's favorite surfing locations
• How to avoid the "Mimic Epidemic"
• How to approach hard to get to people
• Why blazing your own trail is your best chance at being UNMISTAKABLE

In this podcast interview with Joanne Miller, she helps us understand the importance of having a peaceful and healthy home environment. In Joanne's new book, Creating a Haven of Peace (available on Amazon) she stresses the importance of intentional environmental design within your home. Bottom line: Peaceful home = Peaceful life.

In this podcast, my adventure buddy, Ray Cameron and I retell our experience of turning around on our attempt to climb Crestone Peak. Crestone Peak is Colorado's 7th' highest mountain rising to 14,294 feet above sea level. Colorado's has over fifty-eight summits above 14,000 feet and I've been on a quest to summit all 58 of them. Locals call these peaks "14'ers".

How to Scale Influence with Carl Richards | Episode #79

Rob Bell says in his new book, How to Be Here, "We all have a blinking line, a cursor. Your blinking line is whatever sits in front of you waiting to be brought into existence".

The narrative I tell myself everyday frames my Work Life Play. Every morning the tapes in my head begin to play. I used to think somebody else was responsible for those audio files. My High School principal told me once, "You'll never amount to anything". To be fair, I had just dumped dish soap in the biology lab fish tanks and suds overflowed to the top with dead fish. It was TV camera worthy.

Podcast bullet:

• If you don’t like the work you’re doing everyday. We can still choose to do it well.
• It is honorable just doing the hard work of staying alive.
• There is a lot of pressure in our modern world for our lives to be epic and big. Big and epic aren’t helpful when you find yourself in a season of work you don’t love.
• We see with our eyes what we believe we will see. Seeing is believing.
• How we operate in difficult seasons, says a lot about our core beliefs.

1. You are more powerful than you believe.
2. You are more influential than you think.
3. Invest a dollar, an hour, an ounce of emotional energy in yourself.
4. You will never loose.
5. Markets are volatile.  You are steady.
6. Money is fleeting.  You are constant.
7. Risk equals reward and sometimes just a good story.

I had this nutty idea of asking Kristen Howerton if she would be willing to do a podcast interview while riding in a Surrey with the Fringe on Top (picture a four-wheeled carriage with each person peddling) on the Newport Beach, CA boardwalk. She said, That sounds fun. Boom. Game On.  In this episode, we got real...I mean really real. We covered a big range of topics as we bounced through conversations about...

 the pressure of perfectionism, the pretty veneer of social media, social justice, realistic expectations about life and parenting, vulnerability, the political election, LGBT community and religion, white priveledge, Multi-racial families, adoption and being a big-deal blogger.   

It is a fine line between choosing humility or humiliation.  I use this phrase "Eating Humble Pie" when I feel the tension of choice between humility and humiliation. I use this phrase when I find myself walking the fine line between experiencing shame and feeling humbled. I recorded this podcast after walking out of Crossfit class with my tail narrowly tucked between my legs. I got worked. Everyone in the class was ahead of me. I expect the Crossfit fenatics to beat me. I even expect some of the hundred pound women to kick my xxx. Unexpectedly, even the new skinny guy left me in the dust.

Tribes of Belonging

Your tribe of belonging is where you are at home. You know where you fit. You’re part of the tribe and everyone in the tribe knows you belong. You’re comfortable, safe and you can predict what will happen next within the tribe. You’re even apart of defining the rules and system of your tribe of belonging. An easy example is your family. Your hometown, your fraternity or serority, your school, your place of worship and likely your

Tribes of Visitation

Tribes Translator Required

Everyone should be part Mercenaries and equal parts Missionaries. I learned this idea from Mike Rowe the TV show host of Dirty Jobs. He riffed on this idea on a Fast Company video post and shared why he believes that everyone should be both. I unpack this idea of contrast between these two profiles. 

I have a confession to make. I get hung up with self-induced pressure of perfection. I have a vision of what things can become. As a result, I can easily get stuck in the muddy mire of perfect. I make things harder than they need to be. My wife reminds me of how I make things an “event” that don’t need to be. For as many cool things I create and author, there are twice as many projects that I get stuck on. I get hung up adhering to imagined rules that I’ve made impossibly more difficult than things need to be.

I discovered Kevin Butler's art in a Herschel Supply Co. magazine in a surf shop in Laguna Beach, CA. The Journal Issue 2, was intoxicatingly stacked from cover to cover with images of surf, land, sea, play, beauty and art. Kevin's RAD Cars with RAD Surfboards drawings were featured as Herschel's new beach line. I've been dragging around this journal for two years. I caught up with Kevin here on Work Life Play and got the download on how his art has so much soul.

It seems like there are only two choices, Option 1 (the way I've always done it) re Option 2 (the way I don't want to do it). However, I've discovered another option I never knew existed. We've learned to call this unforeseen possibility option "The Third Way". 

Podcast Highlights:

• The high’s and low’s of working side-by-side with Steve Jobs for twelve years.
• Discover the power of defeating complexity with simplicity.
• Watch the 1998 TV ads for the iMac with Jeff Goldblum.
• Why is simplicity so difficult to get right?
• Hear the story about the creation of the first Apple Store and naming the Genius Bar.
• Watch Steve Job’s commencement speech at Stanford “You cannot connect the dots going forward”.

I called my friend Gill at 10 am this morning. “Gill I’m calling you back. What’s up?”

“We’re going to climb Pikes Peak today. You should join us Aaron.”

Pause; remind myself that the lists of excuses for saying “No” are not that important or urgent or necessary. “YES. I’ll be there in an hour”.

Movies are extremely helpful in telling parable stories through the lives of someone else. The two movies that reframed my beliefs about risking saying “YES” more often are The Secret Life of Walter Mitty and Yes Man. These are must see films if you think you might be prone to using the words like,

No

Ahhh, I really need to….

Well it’s been a long time since I….

You know my (person) really was expecting me to…

Keep me in mind for next time….

Give me a heads up next time and I’ll be able to plan better.

Think differently

Business travel does not have to be a drag. Remove resignation from your list of excuses. You can fulfill your work obligations and HAVE A GOOD TIME ALSO.

Come prepared

• adventure clothes
• running/walking/hiking shoes
• Petzl headlamp -my favorite Tikkina (cheap, light, easy)
• light jacket (check out Patagonia's Houdini)
• Gear every Road Warrior should carry

Unfortunately, I experience anxiety. I used to resent the feelings of anxiousness, worry and discomfort. I can't say, I like feeling anxious. However, I've learned to embrace anxiety as a necessary, although sometimes irrational, indicator of perceptions, beliefs and risk. I've learned is that anxiety is always trying to alert me. Like the Tsunami warning sirens broadcasting the early warning detection of pending harm, anxiety is trying to educate us about a perceived threat. As I mature, I am learning to embrace the feeling of anxiety as a early warning detection system. 

Your Good Amount of Weird [Episode #64]

Everybody is weird in a good way. Your weird is your superpower. Embrace your weird. Love your weird. Foster your weird. Practice being weird.

A friend of ours told me a story about her son coming home from school sharing his acrostic (the thing you make where each letter in your name has a word associated with it). His name had a “G” in it and after wrestling with the perfect word to describe himself by only selecting words that start with a “G” he told his mom he wrote

A good amount of weird. Amen brother.

I've only recently embraced the belief that my weird is rare and good. I’m not talking about the kind of weird that means you collect toenail clippings from when you were in the third grade. I’m talking about the kind of weird that makes you have powers like a super hero.

My wife Leith McHugh was interviewed last week on Rob Bell’s Robcast Episode 99 | Leith McHugh on Rebooting Your Life. You will want to listen to this powerful interview. I put together a summary of the nine key areas that were part of our Life Reboot. In this podcast, I walk through each of these key Reboot categories and how to evaluate your own need for a Life Reboot.

This podcast was recorded while backpacking the Colorado Trail at 10,000 feet on Kenosha Pass. I captured a few ideas, a few trail sounds and invite you into our three day 28 mile adventure. 

All the Roots Grow Deeper When It's Dry

You don’t need a destination. You don’t need a lot of money. You don’t need to spend a lot of time planning. You just need to stuff your kids in the car, point in a direction and start driving. Our modern life is too full. Life is too full of responsibilities, objectives, targets, metrics, schedules, measurement, technology, and pressure.

A road trip without a detailed itinerary can help you experience more rest, play, adventure and connection with the people you love. It's almost summer. This podcast will help you get started on your summer road trip with your kids.

Podcast highlights:

• Don't quit your day job. It can fund your dreams.
• Figure out what type of entrepreneur you want to become
• How to structure your life in order to have money or time to invest in your dream gig
• Take the 10% Entrepreneur Quiz to see if you have what it takes. Click here to start.  

“The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he's always doing both.” James Michener

Podcast Highlights with Ben Lecomte:

• From Tokyo to San Francisco in the name of sustainability -The LONGEST Swim
• Why would Ben swim across the Pacific Ocean
• What will he think about while he swims eight hours a day, every day for six months?
• How long did it take for Ben to swim the Atlantic Ocean ten years ago?
• What are the biggest challenges he will face to finish?
• How the lessons Ben learns in the ocean change how he lives on land
• Follow Ben's progress on Twitter
• Follow The Longest Swim on Instagram
• Follow The Longest Swim on Facebook

I picked John up in my 1974 VW Joy Bus and we found a semi-quiet trailhead to park and do the interview in my bus. Friends, I want you to go see this one night movie event in nationwide theaters on Thursday, May 19th. John Eldredge and his sons have made an adventure film that I'm stoked about you experiencing. It's titled, A Story Worth Living (CLICK HERE to view the Trailer). Ransomed Heart has secured theaters across the country to view this film, so you can be assured that there is a theater near you (CLICK HERE to find a theater near you).

Cedar Wright Work Life Play Highlights:

• Cedar's latest film, The Fledglings about paragliding from the summit of 18,490' Pico de Orizaba the third highest mountain in North America.
• Ask yourself, What can I not help but do in life? Go do that.
• Discover what drives you? What are you passionate about? It doesn't matter if can make money in the beginning.
• Cedar lived on less than $5,000.00 per year for a decade before he became the famous climber.

Rob Bell is a brother from another mother. I love this man. I've listened to Rob's voice in my earbuds since early 2000's. When he was a pastor in Grand Rapids Michigan at Mars Hills Church, I would download his weekly sermons and listen to them on my Sunday long runs. Last January, Leith and I went to Rob's Business edition two-day event in Laguna Beach. Last month we spent the day with him and 99 others in Denver at his How to Be Here Experience. In this podcast interview, Rob Bell and I talk about his new book, How to Be Here. 

How I Burned Out and Came Back [Episode #54]

If you've ever burned out, flirted with the idea of burn out or could envision that burn out is in your future, you'll identify with my story. Burn out isn't something most people want to admit happened to them. In a society where superhuman is rewarded and even expected, saying "I can't anymore" isn't what makes the cover of many headlines. Unless of course, a burn out produces drama and carnage. Those stories create lots of buzz.

In my case, I absolutely burned out and my world approached full blown Chernobyl meltdown status. One year later, I think I have a better view into the elements, lifestyle and choices that led to my burn out. I also feel I'm very clear on what I can do differently to live in the green zone and avoid another burn out in my future

This adventure log is another from the Chasing Adventure series that I recorded while traveling to Southern California and a Work Life Play trip. I recorded this one from Joshua Tree National Park. The band U2 made this iconic place famous for their album titled Joshua Tree. It was a disappointing fact that the National Park reported that the album cover photo wasn’t actually taken inside Joshua Tree National Park. Instead, it was captured a hundred miles away somewhere in the desert. Regardless, we rocked Where the Streets Have No Name as we drove through the parks gate.

It's easy to ignore the things in our life that become normal or over time loose their original zeal. It's easy to dream our life away wishing we were somewhere other than where we are. In this Chasing Adventure episode from my week long trip to southern California, my friend Jake and I spent an evening on Stand Up Paddle boards. After we watched the sunset and then the full moon rise over the bay, we recorded our conversation about this story, Be Where You Are.

Los Angeles, CA isn’t immediately the community that comes to mind when I envision a backyard fine dining experience amongst new friends. On my recent Chasing Adventure trip to California, I purposed to orbit my decisions around people, adventure and a loose schedule. My son and I found ourselves in a story we didn’t anticipate. We didn’t realize that we were being invited into real connections with real people, not just a meal.

Picking up surfing isn't easy. Especially when you live a thousand miles away from the ocean. It's humbling being the novice. It's humbling not knowing what to do or how to do it. I think it is even more difficult as an adult man. Most men I know don't try things that they are not good at. In this episode, I talk about my experiences of learning to surf and stumbling forward.

During this episode, I talk about going out with my friend Curious Gabe as we parked near the beach for thirty-minutes and chased adventure. It was simple. It was quick and it was just what we needed. There was no planning needed. There was no big story that surfaced. This type of excursion is available to each of us. What are we waiting for?

I've spent too much of my life holding back. I want to extend for the full length of fun, let's not hold back but go for it.

Adventure Log #2 from my Chasing Adventure trip to SoCal. In this episode, I talk about the easy temptation to reach for my wallet and solve problems of discomfort. Instead, I choose to sit in the discomfort and see what unfolded as I chased adventure, work and relationships.

I don't believe that Work-Life balance is obtainable. The idea of a scale equally balanced with Work on one side and Life on the other is only temporarily obtainable. The only sustainable approach I have found to Work Life Play is in a constant adjustment of rhythm and flow.

How should I write about the width and depth of twenty-two years of marriage, life, kids, vacations, pain, joy, adventure, family, depression, death, new beginnings, sexual orientation, addiction, career, sexual intimacy, and money? In this podcast, my wife Leith and I offer a gritty and raw re-telling of our story.

Instead of writing a post about what we share in this podcast, I will share something I wrote for our friend's wedding, The Way of Love, adapted from 1 Corinthians 13:4. I am not a pastor. I am not a theologian. I am just a guy who learns best when I can relate by practical application. After two decades of marriage, I've learned that love in marriage is beautiful and equally messy.

We printed this and put it up on our refrigerator to remind of us how Love Wins.

Podcast Take Aways:

• Even if you live a mile from the ocean, its easy to get stuck in the rut of always being on and always being available.
• Obligation can easily win when it comes to setting our priorities of rest and play.
• It doesn’t matter where you live, you still have to make a decision to be intentional about finding time to play
• Adventure is available if you will go on a search to find it

You know Conrad Anker, you just might not realize how or why you know him. Let me be your tour guide circa de Conrad Anker's career mile markers. You will quickly recollect how you know him already. His personal mantra is Be Good, Be Kind, Be Happy. In this podcast interview, you'll hear how this approach to Work Life Play fits one of the top Alpinists in the world today.

Don't Do It For Fame | Don't Neglect Your Relationships

03 // Don't do it to pursue fame.

I find this one to be difficult. The truth is I do want to be noticed. Behind that shallow layer of hoping I’m seen, the deeper truth is I want my life to matter. When I am writing, the pursuit of fame can surface with its natural gravitational pull.

Here is how it can sound,

“Maybe so-and-so will read this and then he will share it and then his six million followers will read it”.

It is a bit embarrassing to admit, but I believe you’ve heard this whisper also. When I was writing with my focus on being noticed, it was crap. No wonder no one read any of it. When I made the shift to simply be authentic, a few people began to notice. There is great irony in this principle. The more we are authentic and relevant, the more the possibility of being noticed increases.

When the pursuit of fame is our motive, the less authentic and relatable we become. Whatever you are pursuing, do a motive check and remind yourself that what the world really needs is you to be authentically you. That is our best bet for being noticed.

04 // Don't neglect your relationships.

A friend told me about a saying from his mentor, “The grass is greener wherever you water it.” I’ve been married for over twenty years and I have not always regularly irrigated our relationship. When I was age 25, I thought my wife could be more like xeriscaping: drought-tolerant. Turns out she never signed up for an inch of rain every three months. I’ve learned the hard way that growth comes where you regularly water.

Trust me, your spouse, your friends, your family, your significant other, your sibling, your neighbor, your employees, your child... would gladly receive some relational watering from you.

Go find that watering can.

I’ve found a lot of people talk a good game about consistency, but in reality, they have a lot of false starts. Many people seem to struggle with consistently doing the work that needs to be done, whether it is in our jobs, on side projects, or in our relationships.

02 // Work on what you love.

Life is short. You are really good at something. Find that something and do that. Drudgery is for prisoners doing time for crimes committed. You haven’t done anything wrong, right? Stop doing what you can barely stand doing and start pursuing what you love. Too many people never do what they love. Even worse, they don’t ever explore the frontier to find what it is they love.

Questions to ask yourself?

1. When you used to be adventures, what did you do?
   What did you love before you got married, had a family and got a big job?
2. What do you believe stands in your way today to reclaiming your adventurous spirit again?
3. How can you begin to choose differently in small increments to provide room for adventure again?