Have you noticed how easy it is to look back on the hardest times and see the lesson clearly, yet when you were in it, all you wanted was for it to be over?
Pain often disguises itself as punishment. Most of the time it is part of the process. The lesson, the gift (even if we hate the wrapping). Growth lives on the other side of whatever you would rather avoid.
Here is the thing: You cannot bypass what you are meant to go through.
If you do, you risk ignoring the lesson and compounding the problem. Making the same mistake again. Or turning to escape. And escape can lead to addiction.
So, what is your version of things not being perfect right now?
What have you maybe wanted to ignore, shut down, push down or wish it would just go away? Do you keep trying to skirt around it instead of going through it?
Pretending is a subtle, but destructive form of dishonesty. It cuts off connection, numbs truth, and quietly erodes prosperity.
You do not have to share every detail with everyone. It is extraordinarily helpful though to have a trusted few who can hold space for honesty and help you move without judgment.
Progress begins with awareness. Healing begins with truth. Mistakes do not define you. They refine you.
Ask yourself:
- What am I pretending not to know?
- Who can I trust to help me face it?
- How might this be happening for me, not to me?
Go through it. Learn from it. And as you do, find ways to enjoy the entire process, the ups, the downs, and the space in between. That is where your rich life lives. That is reality. That is being human.
The Question Is Yours
You already know what hurts. You also know what you hope.
- What is the hard thing you are carrying that you have not said out loud yet?
- Where are you trying to sprint past, push down, or ignore rather than listen, learn, or sit with the lesson?
- What is one step you could take today to grow, heal, and process something that is less than ideal?
Honesty is the starting line. When people stay secretive about their feelings around money, hide mistakes, or judge themselves for not being further along, they lock themselves in scarcity. Isolation prolongs pain.
Where is your safe space to tell the truth?
Who are your people, the ones you can be unedited with?
What would change if you let yourself be seen?
Life is never all good or all bad. It ebbs and flows. Can you enjoy the wave?
What would it take to remember what you were born to do, who you are, and what you want?
Find that space. It is where you stop pretending, performing and start progressing.
Go Through It, Not Around It
There is a difference between distraction and design. Distraction looks like scrolling, snacking, binge working, or binge worrying. Design looks like creating a game you actually want to play.
A winning life is not about clutching and protecting or chasing and hustling. Those are losing games. The alternative is simple to say, harder to practice. Win, then play. Define the win, write the rules, then step onto the field.
Try this today: Define your win for the next 30 days. Not a trophy. Instead, a way of being. What does it look like when you are present, true to your values, and enjoying the process regardless of outcomes? Write it in one sentence.
When the win is in the work, you can walk through discomfort with purpose. The work becomes meaningful. Outcomes become a bonus.
Your Trusted Few
You do not have to tell everyone everything. In fact, please do not. Oversharing can be another form of hiding. Retelling stories can deepen it in your neurology.
Choose a trusted few who can listen without rescuing you from the lesson. There is a right time for a hug and a right time for a question. Sometimes you need someone to grab your hand.
Sometimes you need someone to ask, “What is the next courageous step?”
Build an inner circle that will do three things:
- Hold confidentiality and space.
- Ask questions that help you see your truth.
- Offer perspective.
Content is key, but community is king. Prosperity is not a do-it-yourself game. With the right relationships, with a safe space to be vulnerable and share, guilt and shame lose their grip, and you finally learn the lesson because you can do the work.
When you know who you can talk to and where to go, you carry power into every room.
A Story to Borrow Perspective
There was a season when my outward success and marriage were not aligned. My calendar looked impressive. My marriage did not. I kept saying yes to business and no to presence, telling myself it was temporary. That lie cost me connection.
One day I stopped trying to be right and started trying to be real (sounds like a promo for The Real World, if you are old enough to remember that). I brought the structure I used in business into our relationship.
We started a weekly meeting at home. Forty-five to sixty minutes. No phones. One metric to start. Presence. On a scale of 1 to 10, how present was I this week. What would it take to be a 10? That was the question and the quest.
We added a practice we now call the do-over. It is simple and humbling. If one of us says something careless or defensive, we can ask for a do over. We acknowledge the impact, breathe, and reset the moment. Not just an apology. A redo.
Those rhythms did not erase every hard thing, yet they kept small hurts from becoming big ones. They gave us a way to move through emotion instead of around it.
Translation for you: Schedule a weekly forty five to sixty minute meeting with your trusted person or partner. Start with presence. Share one win, one worry, and one next step. Keep it sacred. Let honesty do its work.
We make coffee. Sometimes the record player spins. Sometimes we sit in the backyard and enjoy the view.
In those simple moments we refine the calendar, create the future, and address unresolved friction. We dream. We heal. We choose each other again.
Name It to Claim It
We do coffee and convos. Vision and Visits. Sunday Brunch. Wednesday Webinars. Sauna and Sales.
I create locations that remind me and anchor to what is most important. Create space, identify the spaces, name what you are doing, carve it out in the calendar, find time, and invest in the things that matter most.
Name the things that help you dream. That help you build the future you want. And have rhythms that allow for the most important things to happen.
One small iteration can begin a completely new journey.
Maybe you need a do-over with your schedule. Maybe you need one with yourself.
What would free you to dream of the future if you healed the past. Name the space, the items and they things you will do. Then name where you need a do over. Then take it.
Check Your Foundation
Roots determine fruit. If the soil is fear, doubt, and worry, no strategy will taste sweet for long. If the soil is faith, hope, and love, even imperfect strategies can grow something good.
Before you chase a tactic, check your foundation.
Try this:
- What belief is feeding your current pain. Fear of never enough. Worry about losing what you have. Doubt that you can handle what is ahead.
- What abundant belief will replace it. There is always a way to create value. My worth is not my net worth. I am not alone.
Lately I asked what it would take to strengthen my mind. The answers were not glamorous. Write daily. Spend time with people who lift me. Create a shared vision and revisit it with my wife. Invest in my team. Care for my health. Sleep.
When a limiting thought enters, I give it to God and ask, What is true? What is there to learn? What emotion do I need to feel and process?
I do not pretend it did not happen. I do not let it hijack my day. I write. I meet with coaches. I make something.
Your paradigm becomes your process. Your process creates your results. What would it take to upgrade how you use your time. Which skill would make the greatest impact. Which belief must be replaced so you can succeed and be present.
Mistakes Happen
They will. Count on it. Success is not the absence of mistakes. It is the presence of awareness, accountability, and adjustment.
Treat mistakes as tuition, not identity. They are guideposts and guardrails. They nudge you back to your path. They are not final. They are invitations.
You can carry the lesson and leave the shame.
The Space Between Pain and Progress
Let us circle back. Have you noticed how easy it is to look back and see the lesson, yet when you were in it, all you wanted was for it to end?
Pain often disguises itself as punishment. Most of the time it is part of the process. You cannot bypass what you are meant to go through.
My version included losing two close friends in a plane crash. In 2023 it looked like a health scare that led to the slow drip of insomnia and the faster unraveling of partnerships that had run their course.
I wanted to skip grief and get back to normal. There was no skipping. Only sitting in it, telling the truth, and choosing what mattered most from that point on.
What did I learn?
How to be a leader. How to speak up and say what I mean and ask for what I want. That I can do things on my own and hire people, I don’t always have to partner. Working with who I love creates more of a life I love. Purpose motivates. Knowing and standing for my value is worth it, if I don’t it is costly and robs me being present or paid. Some relationships are seasonal. When you stop dreaming of the future, you become a victim of the past.
You have your version of the highs and lows. The lows? Maybe it is a mistake you keep reliving, a betrayal you keep rehearsing, or a season where you feel lost. Pretending it is fine does not make it so. Pretending is a quiet form of pain.
What would people yell at the screen of the movie of your life? What have you yet to learn or face?
You do not owe your life story to the crowd. But having those trusted few, that is the gamechanger. Find those people who will look you in the eye and love you enough to ask real questions.
We all make mistakes. The key is not to let them define you. Let them refine you.
So, ask yourself:
- What am I pretending not to know.
- Who can I trust to help me face it.
- How might this be happening for me, not to me.
Go through it. Learn from it. And as you do, enjoy the process, the ups, the downs, and the space in between.
That is where your richest life lives.
