Doing a list of five simple things is easy for one or two days. Doing it 75 days in a row is how you get things done… but it’s hard. 75 Hard is a life program developed by Andy Frisella . I learned about it on his podcast now called The Real AF. I’ve now done a bunch of them and keep going because they made me better. I originally started this blog and podcast to chronicle my journey. But I noticed that as a grew as a person through this program it made my kid and wife want to be better. And the...
Jul 26, 2021•9 min
Do you ever have problems starting something in life? Do you need to make it easy to start, or impossible to stay where you are? Do you set yourself up for success or just white-knuckle it? This is my fifth or sixth 75 Hard Challenge and I’m just finishing day 3. Normally I’m really excited in the beginning and takes a couple of weeks before I feel burned out or tired. This time around, I didn’t even what to start. I know it’s good for me but I avoid it… or tried to. Do you avoid things you know...
Jul 15, 2021•9 min
Honor, Courage, Commitment was the core values of the US Marine Corps while I was in. The greatest of these is the commitment to continue, to push forward, to win, and to complete anything. The commitment to continue doing what you need to do to win, day in and day out without any visible sign of change, is how you change your life for the best. Most people want one great thing, or one big push to become great in life. They are looking to score that last point in the final game for the big victo...
Jun 20, 2021•9 min
How much do you study to succeed? Success is a matter of working hard and effectively at the right thing. Simple. Just not easy… like most things in life. Over the last couple of years I’ve started studying books, not just readying or listening to them. And then doing what the book says. It’s how and why I started 75 Hard. Do you actually do what you read and hear? Me neither… most of the time. Lately I’ve started doing those things. I’ve also started taking notes and going through the books mul...
Jun 07, 2021•9 min
How to be more disciplined in your life by forgetting about discipline and just doing what needs to be done. I spent 10 years in the United States Marine Corps and got to learn a lot about discipline the hard way. It was a way of life, but it wasn’t the kind of discipline most of you want in your life. But it is the kind we think about all the time. From first hand experience, it is the kind of discipline that sucks. How to be more disciplined isn’t what you are really looking for. It’s more sel...
May 23, 2021•9 min
Which wave are you riding? Success and failure come in waves. You are either riding one or the other. You just can’t stay where you are. And it would be better to catch a wave in the direction you are headed. The problem is tons of people catch the failure wave in lots of things they do in life. Are you on this wave? It starts with your mindset. Just like everything else in life, whether you think you can or you can’t, you are right. For me, that mindset starts with focusing on the negativity of...
May 16, 2021•9 min
I’m slipping, falling off the horse and need to get back up and try again. At this point in my life, I’m not sure if it is easier or harder that I know I have done it in the past. In the past, I’ve been in great shape. In the past, I’ve gone from obese to 18% or less body fat multiple times. In the past, I’ve been as strong as an ox. In the past, I could have accomplished anything physically. So I know I can do it… or could have done it? I’m not sure… But here I am. The three fitness factors I l...
May 11, 2021•9 min
Do you know how to be successful in life? Success is what you make of it and what you decide it is. You define what success is. My kid keeps telling me we should be billionaires. I’m not going to be that successful. It’s not what I’m shooting for. Maybe I just don’t have an imagination. I am trying to be and become more successful in many areas of my life. Last week I started reading “The Official Guide to Success” by Tom Hopkins. It’s an oldie but a goody. The first chapter gives the secret I’m...
May 02, 2021•9 min
There will always be something that gets in your way. Go around, through, over, or destroy it to meet your objective. Over the last two weeks, I’ve been letting a stupid ruling by Google stop me from writing on this blog. I was actually making a little more money on Google Adsense than it costs me to run this blog. It wasn’t big money, but it was nice to have. I was profiting about $50 a month. Enough for a nice dinner. Then Google again said there was a problem with my ads and they demonetized ...
Apr 08, 2021•9 min
Sometimes burning the boats is how to get things done. Getting productive things done is always the challenge of every person that wants to be great. But what is productive? And how do we get them done? I’m reading The Millionaire Fastlane by MJ DeMarco and had an epiphany. It’s a good book if you want to be rich. And it is helping me get motivated to get things done. My epiphany was on what to get done, and how to measure what is productive. I’ve been working on “side-hustles” on the web for ab...
Mar 23, 2021•9 min
Overcoming obstacles is about your mindset and what you do, not about the obstacle. Last week I had my first “bad day” at work. I’ve been doing the job for about six months now and enjoying the challenge, the work, and the obstacles there. I saw everything as a leadership challenge and a problem to be solved. As usual, those things take longer to change than you ever anticipate. Instead of hiring another person, we lost one. And, in case you missed the national news, Texas had a major snowstorm ...
Mar 14, 2021•9 min
Sometimes you just have to rise and grind through to get to the next stage, or just something better. A couple of weeks ago I survived snowpocalypse / snovid here in San Antonio Texas. It was an exciting week with lots of challenges. While the snow is gone I am still digging myself out and trying to find the week I lost while snowed in. Now it’s back to the grind. I have lots of work to get back on track. Do you ever feel like it’s just a rise and grind time in your life? You get up, do what nee...
Mar 07, 2021•9 min
Should you stop improving yourself for the test or keep going? Last week was a frozen hell in San Antonio Texas. No power, water, or internet for most of the work week with temperatures well below freezing all week (-10 with windchill). For Texas it was cold. None of the systems built in Texas are designed for cold. They are all designed for mild winters and 100 plus-degree summers. Our homes and road are designed to be cooled and not warmed. Most years I don’t need a heater in my home for more ...
Feb 27, 2021•14 min
How much water do you drink? How much water should you drink to lose weight? For your health? I’ve been failing on my health journey lately. I’ve given up the 75 Hard Challenge I started the day after Christmas because I just couldn’t do it. One of the things I failed was drinking water. Water is the best weight loss drink on the planet. I want to lose weight, but still failed to drink enough water. It’s those simple things that can get us every time. Unless you’ve been in the military, you prob...
Feb 14, 2021•9 min
Does stress eating actually happen? Yes, stress eating is a thing. It comes from us having an unhealthy relationship with food, or so I’m told. I just know that stress has been getting to me lately. We are down two people at work and I’m trying to cover down and do three peoples’ jobs. All three are getting done, but none of them are getting done well. Which stresses me out more. The more stressed I get, the more I turn to stress eating. I want donuts, cakes, nachos, and pancakes. I want to eat ...
Feb 07, 2021•9 min
Keeping your sanity can be a trick in today’s crazy world. Here is a trick I picked up recently that might help. Our world continues to change and stay the same. Fads come and go at the speed of light, and some of our underlying societal problems seem to be the same today as decades ago. You need to focus on what you can do toward keeping your sanity. If you watch the news, read social media, or talk to anyone it feels like the world is going to end tomorrow. It hasn’t yet, and probably won’t to...
Jan 26, 2021•9 min
“… our success as a society, depends not on what happens in the White House, but on what happens inside your house.” – Barbra Bush Your success depends on what happens in your house and not what happens in the White House or any other house for that matter. What you do matters! What you do makes you successful or a failure! The way you lead your family matters and makes it successful. What happens in the world matters to your success so little that you should stop thinking about it. A couple wee...
Jan 19, 2021•9 min
Focus on yourself to be successful in everything you do in life. What do you look like when you focus on yourself? Are you where you want to be? Are you on the road to where you want to be? Do you know where you want to be? Easy questions right…. wrong. That last question is something I’ve struggled with all my life. I’ve always looked ahead to something vague and broad. I’m not really sure why I couldn’t focus down on what I wanted. I think it is part of that inward journey we are all on for a ...
Jan 10, 2021•9 min
Bring it on! I’m ready to conquer 2021 after the shit show of 2020. I’m seven days into my 75 Hard Challenge, which might as well be my New Years Resolution. I tried to start the day after Christmas and failed, but then restarted the next day. Now I’m seven days down and 68 to go! How well did you start 2021 and when? After the shit-show that was 2020, I was ready to start early. And I started by trying a 75 Hard before Christmas and failing. Then I reset for the day after Christmas and failed. ...
Jan 03, 2021•9 min
Hope for the future maybe all we have this year. As 2020 wraps up is there hope for the future? I have hope. Lots of it! I’m trying to make 2021 my best year ever. I thought 2020 was going to be one of the best years ever but turned into a building year for me. New job, new career, new industry, a complete and utter change. And I like it. Hope is a great gift. Hope deferred makes the heart sick. It’s hard to get anywhere without hope for the future. How’s your hope? Do you have any? 2020 has kic...
Dec 27, 2020•9 min
The list that could change your life. After failing in the second week of my fifth 75 Hard Challenge, I’m 3 for 2 right now (I’ve finished three and failed two), I’m looking for things to push my life forward. This week I started using the “Power List” from Andy Frisella . It’s a simple concept; just make a list of five things you are going to get done today and then do them. Most “gurus” out there say make a list of three things and get them done. I could never cut my day down to three things. ...
Dec 16, 2020•9 min
Failure is an option in everything we do in life, and it happened to me a couple of days ago. Every self-help guru says failure is just a learning opportunity. They may be right but it doesn’t seem to help. Last week I failed 75 Hard. I missed one of my five things and then thought, I’d just keep going. Then I did it again the next day. Then the day after that I missed another thing. By day four of missing, I just quit lying to myself thinking I could keep going and quit doing everything on the ...
Dec 07, 2020•9 min
What’s the secret to accomplishment? Just keep going… It’s day 10 or 75. I have a long way to go. But that doesn’t bother me. I’m having a problem with the diet. I’ve been on the diet for 10 days now and haven’t lost a pound… sort of. I lost 3.6 and then found it again in a week. I’m 0.9 pounds heavier than when I started. I was super excited about losing weight and was completely on board with the diet… Now that I am back up almost a pound in 10 days is a real bummer. I almost want to quit…. al...
Dec 03, 2020•9 min
I continue on to complete the mission… no matter what. As a Marine I was taught that mission completion was above everything. To complete the mission was more important then an individual Marine, then yourself, or the Marines in your command. Giving my life seemed easy. Losing my Marines seemed impossible. As a young Marine, I was given missions constantly. Then as a Platoon Sergeant, I was given bigger missions and even had to write my own. The missions were all more important than anything. Ev...
Nov 29, 2020•12 min
The Slow Carb Diet is the only diet I’ve been able to stay on and lose weight. My five things to do for 75 days that makes this the hard challenge. Slow Carb Diet Miracle Morning Drink One gallon of Water One Thing to Advance my Career or Business at Work Snap-in These are the five things I need to do for 75 days to complete the challenge. I picked the five things that I think will advance my current life right now. I am going to do all of them for 75 days. The slow carb diet is something I foun...
Nov 25, 2020•12 min
So I just started. I was trying to plan a big run so that I could do a 75 Hard Challenge with you, but couldn’t wait. With my new job and a lot of things going on in my life I need a couple more wins. The 75 Hard program is a great way to win in life no matter what else is going on. If you haven’t done the original plan, that’s where you should start. Do these five things every day for 75 days. Work out 2 times per day, 45 minutes each, at least 1 has to be outside Drink 1 Gallon of Water per da...
Nov 24, 2020•19 min
Surviving Covid-19 with mindset I survived Covid-19. I had it bad. I’m not sure it would have actually killed me, but I was convinced if I had to be admitted to the hospital my chances of dying shot up 10 fold. So I kept myself out of the hospital by convincing myself I was going to survive and creating affirmations to tell myself in the mirror. Multiple times, more than one doctor looked at hospitalizing me because of my low blood oxygen levels, the severity of my symptoms, and my lack of recov...
Nov 18, 2020•16 min
The secret of life is easy… just keep going until you get what you want. Life isn’t over until it’s over. If you just keep going, sooner or later you will get what you want. Sometimes you find a way to shift along the way, but you just keep going. I got a new job and still have the old job for another two months. I just have to keep going. I’m working without a day off for almost two months. I think my next day off is Thanksgiving, or if I’m lucky the weekend before. I’m good with that. I can ma...
Oct 08, 2020•13 min
Now begins my season of work! For everything there is a season. There is a season to plant, there is a season to harvest. There is a season to rest and there is a season of work. I had my season of rest while I was unemployed. Now I have two jobs and it is a season of work. I’m not complaining, but my next day off is Thanksgiving! Two months straight. I’ve done worse. I’ll be okay. Be careful of what you wish for. Now I’m in a season of work. I finally found a “real” job that pays really well an...
Oct 02, 2020•14 min
My emotional control isn’t doing well right now. Do you ever have that feeling when your emotions run away from you for the stupidest reasons? Pick your favorite This last week has been a roller coaster for me! I’m looking at a new job in a new industry and really excited about it. When anything happens that is unexpected it makes my anxiety kick in. Nothing more unnerving than the unknown. I’m trying to cope. After 40 years of working on it as a man, and 10 years in the Marine Corps, where I wa...
Sep 16, 2020•17 min
