If you don’t have goals that you can look at every day, dream about every day when shit gets hard, when it gets dark, it’s going to feel like everything is caving in, trapped, no hope. 

It’s going to be very, very hard to pick yourself back up. You’re going to feel like you failed, you let people down, the energy will be drained right out of you. Is this sounding at all familiar?

You are probably experiencing one or all of those right now. What the fuck am I going to do? How can I fix this, how can I turn this around when I just seem to be getting my ass kicked in all directions?

Two years ago, I was accepted into one of the biggest goals of my life around personal development as part of the Arete Accelerator Program. I remember when I dropped out of school my whole life was about finding mentors. If I could learn from the world’s best as somebody that did not do well in school, I might have a fighting chance to leave a mark in the world.

One of the very first things Ed Mylett and Andy Frisella said to me was this, “You’re going to want to make it your goal to move into Arete Syndicate.” I had just hit one goal that took over 16 years to come to reality and you want me to up it again? If you didn’t know, Arete is about excellence and mastery, it’s the blue checkmark of entrepreneurship of individuals that are here to make a difference in the world and are working towards that.

For the next 2 years, I would never miss a call, I would write down word for word notes on every detail, every word and soak it in, implement, try and test it out at the speed of instruction. Although I am a very private and quiet dude, I was listening.

One very powerful step is on the basis that obsessions become possessions. Ed and Andy spoke so detailed about how their goals were written, how it sounded to them, and how they would think about it down to the second - the amount of work it took to make happen.

Ed said, you’re going to want to put it as your phone screensaver, you want to think about it as soon as you wake up, as soon you open the car, as soon as you walk into the office, as soon as you walk into the gym, as soon as you get home, and as the very last thing you think about every day.

I did exactly that. I would be lying if I said it was perfect every day, but there wasn’t at least a day that I haven’t thought about it, thought about being in the Arete Syndicate. I created a screensaver with the words, Member of the Arete Syndicate, hundreds of times a day I would just see this same thing over and over again as a constant reminder to stay in the fight, to get the hell up and hang in long enough.

So today I look at my phone, it says Member of the Arete Syndicate. I see a notification and the Arete Accelerator has now grown into the Arete Syndicate. The exact same thing I was chasing although in a different format to what I was working towards is right here in front of me.

Now let me be clear, up until this point you’re probably like well, that’s great for you but that has nothing to do with me. Wrong, this has everything to do with you, you are sitting there right now may be without hope, down, depressed, losing the fight. Maybe you’re on the other side, even smashing it.

There is a process, a strategy that only the very few are willing to put the time and effort into following. The recipe, if you’re willing, is in right there in front of you.

By achieving this goal, this does not mean, I have won. This does not mean I will stop, I will put my feet up, in fact, it’s the opposite. The job is not finished for me, it never will be, the only next move is to find another level that I can work towards and look at every day and every night.

If you’ve made it this far, that means you have fight left in you, you are not out. This very feeling when you’re not winning is actually a good thing. You might not see it now, but only when you’re looking back in a few years will you be able to connect these dots.

You’re building the foundations of something massive. So if I can teach and share nothing else with you, start with the one thing that’s still burning inside, put that down, and then think about it, taste it, dream it, then go do the work to get it.

In 16 years or 2 years or whenever it is for you, I want you to look back and connect the dots and if you are whom I think you are, you’ll say the same thing: Job’s not finished.