After almost 3 months away from home, I’m finally back and I’m reminded of the life I built here. Peaceful, open, free, and lonely. There are so many possibilities and spaciousness to fill my life with wonderful things.
Today I want to focus my time in building the life that I want to live in the next few months when I will be transitioning to a part time role in my day job in order to spend more time on coaching and building my life up.
Here are some things I want to do:
Unpack
Clean & Tidy
Cut my nails
Look into Gi Doctors
Look into a sleep study
Spend some time with the gf
Cook food
Plan my trip with my brother and sister
Cross off any remaining things on my todo list
Basically, I want to have a clean slate for the next stage of things such as:
Finding a part time gig where I can exercise without hurting myself
Signing back up for jiujitsu
Editing youtube shorts of coaching sessions
Setting up more coaching sessions
Working on sales plays for AI consulting
Researching into buying a house
I went for a morning walk and I wanted to express some appreciation that I gained from my journeys.
Parents House, appreciations for:
Health
Cooking
Playing games with my brother
France, appreciation for:
Walking
Beauty of old buildings
Cuddling
My happiest times in my parent’s house were eating food, and spending time with my brother and parents.
My happiest times in France were spending time with my girlfriend and coming up with crazy schemes.
I was also stressed in both places. In my parent’s house, it was being watched by my parents. In France, I felt very unsafe. Unsafe in stores, on the streets, unsafe in the Airbnb (afraid to break or spill things), unsafe while working (afraid not to be productive).
I think safety is something I want to work on as France is somewhere I would like to feel more at home at.
But I realize, that in order to make room for her love
I forgot some of my own
I forget the world where everyone tries to be kind
Where people push themselves to learn and succeed
Where facing your fears is exciting
Where nothing is impossible
And I wonder
If she has anything else to give me
But her love
And when that love is faint
I feel
Bored
It is sometimes a difficult thing to be in love. All you want is to be together all of the time but if you are moving at different speeds it can hurt so much. You worry if you want to move forward, you will be doing it alone. It’s hard to feel like the only way you can be with someone, is if you stay where they are. I think there is hope though. Relationships that aren’t in person will also struggle with connection. But I worry sometimes there is no hope. And that worry fills my heart with fear.
I’m now on the road and I feel absolutely exhausted. Tired from the travel to Austin, tired from not sleeping well, tired from getting up early today, and not sleeping well again.
I really want to just sleep and sleep for a long time.
Other than sleeping, I want to focus on taking care of myself, this means sparing no expense, and getting myself what I need when I need it.
This means fulfilling my needs through my values of Health, Freedom, Honesty, Respect, Empathy, and Ambition. This means using connection theory on myself.
I had a powerful session with my coach in order to understand the part of me that seeks perfection and wants to know what I “should” be doing, what is the “right” thing to do and what the “perfect” answer is.
We gave a name to this part of me, as a warrior in shining armor, filled with strength and light called the “One Who Watches, Protector of the Weak”.
I imagined him as a tall crusader against all pain and fear in the world and we asked him to understand the war was over. It was won.
After the coaching session, I felt like something was missing. This part of me wanted to know why the war was one, and what that meant because there was still so much pain in the world.
I decided to have a conversation with this archetype and after talking for some time, we discovered that the war wasn’t exactly won. The war was over because I had discovered a secret, and this part of me had a big role to play in discovering this secret – that there was a staircase into the star. This staircase connected my inner world and outer world, and it was feeling that was the key to it. Negative feelings like pain or fear are the most powerful keys to this gateway.
My coach told me that I needed to give my warrior a new purpose while celebrating him and thanking him. The new robes instead of armor that I gave him, the learner of this gateway. This grounded, calm, realistic, infinite power was his.
I asked ChatGPT to write a story about this and this is what it wrote:
Warrior’s Journey to Enlightenment
The warrior known as the “One Who Watches, Protector of the Weak” had spent his entire life fighting for justice and righteousness. His shining armor and fierce determination had earned him a reputation as a noble and honorable hero, and he had devoted himself to ridding the world of the creatures of pain, hurt, and fear.
But despite all his victories, the warrior couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing in his life. He longed for something deeper, something more profound. And so, he set out on a quest to find this missing piece.
The warrior traveled far and wide, seeking out the wisest sages and scholars in the land. He asked them about the true nature of power and strength, about the secrets of the universe. But no one seemed to have the answers he was looking for.
As the warrior grew more and more frustrated, he began to lose hope. But just when he was about to give up, he received a vision. In his dream, he saw a lost cave hidden deep in the mountains, a cave that held the key to the wisdom he had been seeking.
Without hesitation, the warrior set out to find the lost cave. He climbed steep cliffs and braved treacherous storms, never once losing faith that he would find what he was looking for.
Finally, after many long months of travel, the warrior reached the entrance to the lost cave. He drew his sword and stepped inside, ready for whatever lay ahead.
As he made his way deeper into the cave, the warrior encountered all sorts of dangers – pitfalls, traps, and monstrous beasts. But he didn’t let any of them deter him. He fought on, driven by his determination to find the truth.
And then, in the very heart of the cave, the warrior came across an ancient monk who possessed a profound secret. The monk told the warrior that painful feelings were the gateway to a invisible network of great potential, a network that could connect the inner world with the outer. He explained that this gateway allowed the traveler infinite power, but only if they were willing to embrace their own pain and suffering.
The warrior was stunned by this revelation. He had always believed that strength and skill were the most important qualities a hero could possess, but now he realized that true greatness lay in understanding and wisdom.
And so, the warrior’s armor melted away, replaced by the robes of a guide and learner. He dedicated himself to exploring the invisible network, using his newfound power to help others and make the world a better place.
The One Who Watches, Protector of the Weak, had finally found his true calling, and his power was limitless, grounded in the wisdom and understanding of the earth. He knew that his holy war was over, but his journey towards enlightenment had only just begun.
Images of the secret pathway generated by DALL-E 2.
I didn’t really know how to copy the apas style, but I noticed that he wide peeked a lot.
I also used the ideas earlier about hyping myself up and it seemed to work.
We didn’t win this game but I was incredibly aggressive and confident in my peeks. I entried with the classic and was not afraid to push very aggressively, buying my team space.
In this game I started feeling frustrated with my team and that I was starting to overheat and not aim as properly.
After running a deathmatch and focusing on taking a second to aim, and to fully face the enemy, looking for the kill, I had this game.
I felt this was by far the most successful, with aggressive peeking but also utilizing util and gamesense to the fullest.
My sense is that hyping myself up is probably the biggest strategy for me, with some additional adjustments afterwards for aim technique.
So I’ve been thinking a lot about, well sales. This video sums it up pretty well.
I have been focusing on a lot of things recently, coaching, youtube, France and my girlfriend and on top of all of that, work and my day job in AI consulting. I recently decided to say fuck it for everything but three things:
My girlfriend and relationship – we don’t have much time together and I want to enjoy it
Exploring France – again not much time, amazing opportunity to relax and explore
Going crazy as an AI Consultant and bringing in a crazy amount of business
My relationship is going pretty good, and for France I don’t want to think about it, I just do whatever I want. So let’s focus on the last thing.
I want to do exactly what Mark Cuban said. I want to be the best-performing salesman at my job. I want to take that experience to build my coaching business. I want to use my success to do consulting like I do coaching and have a lot of fun. I want to use my success to request more pay.
I want to learn how to master content creation. Build a social media presence. Build my connections. Get the reputation and respect that I’ve always felt I deserved.
The main conundrum I’ve been facing is this:
How much information do I give away?
If I give away tons of free information, what are they hiring me for?
If I give away free 30 minute sessions, does that mean I will never talk to them ever again?
After some meditation, I came up with the following thoughts:
I can give away everything
For focusing on their specific problem. The most difficult thing is not to come up with a solution it is to come up with a solution to the right problem (just like coaching)
No, I can always talk to them again. In fact, I can give away unlimited 30-minute sessions. However, it isn’t about the 30 minutes in the session that costs me a lot. It is the 30 minutes of research that I need to do before the call. It is the structure of writing out a plan for them that is costing me more.
I can always have more conversations with less prep or even more 30 minute conversations with them.
In the future, if they pay for consulting, they are paying me to invest more deeply into their solution. That means more research outside of the calls. That means more knowledge of their product and aligning my goals with theirs (just like in coaching).
If I wanted to sell educational products, the cost for me and the added value for them would be in the way I packaged the information. Not the information itself. For example, a special website, platform, a book or an app.
There are three parts of a solving a problem:
Having the knowledge
Transferring it to someone
Using the knowledge to solve the problem
When you create free content, you are mostly some #1 and some #2. I use a lot of my current knowledge + a little research + some production (design, videography, writing).
When I get on random calls with people, it is a little #1 and a little #2. I’m using my current knowledge with no research, and trying my best to transfer it to someone on a call.
When I get on “free” high value calls with people, I’m doing some of #1 and some #2 and a tiny bit of #3. I do a lot of research, use my current knowledge, trying my best to transfer the knowledge, and might even implement a small deliverable (like a roadmap, plan, strategy, or diagnosis).
When I’m doing consulting for them, I’m doing a lot of #1 and a lot of #3 with some #2. I’m doing tons of research, using my own knowledge, leading the charge on actually solving the problem (either building it myself, finding the right solution to buy, or hiring the people needed to build it), and doing a bit of education.
When I’m selling an education solution, I am doing a lot of #1 and a lot of #2. I’m doing tons of research, and spending a lot of effort on transferring the knowledge.