Life is Not Meant to be Just OK

Hello and welcome to the Soul of Innovation podcast. I am the host, Thomas Anglero, and my mission for this podcast is to share with you those private thoughts and reflections that I have being one of the top keynote speakers around the world on technology, motivation, and innovation. I hope you truly enjoy all the lessons I share, all the dots I connect that sometimes are just really difficult to get out but it's all for you. I truly hope you enjoy this episode.

Welcome to the Soul of Innovation podcast. I am Thomas Anglero, and I am— been talking to a few people, and this theme keeps coming up, and that is that people seem happy with settling. Taking no risk and living life that way and being proud of it. And it astonishes me how much energy we put into having this perfect life that is just like everybody else's, this perfect life of not too big ups, not too big downs. Matter of fact, no ups, no downs, really play it safe. Don't do anything different than anybody else. Make sure that you don't stick your head up above the crowd, that people see you and get your head chopped off, and too low that people think you're depressed. Always sort of do everything that's in the middle. Let me ask you something.

Are you out of your damn mind? Are you living? Is— I mean, seriously, all the crap you've gone through in your life and you're gonna settle for being like everybody else you can't stand? Think about it. You're listening to this podcast right now because you made a choice that you're looking for something. You want inspiration, you want to make a choice in life, you want to handle life, you want to control life, and yet you do what everybody else does. You want to be like everybody else, you want to dress like everybody else, you buy the car or live in the same clothes, everything's same, same, same, same. Let me clue you in on a fact. Nobody sees you.

Sees you. Because you're nothing special. And I'm not saying that to hurt your feelings.

I love you.

But if you persist on measuring yourself prior to making any decisions, you get out of bed in the morning, you're going to choose clothes and you actually think, oh, what are people going to think of me when I wear these clothes?

Are you Crazy.

You should say, how do I feel today? How should the world experience me today? I want to go with some hot pink. You know, every Friday I wear pink. It's my tradition. Every Friday I wear a pink shirt. That's what I do. And the world experiences Thomas Anglero in pink. Every single Friday. That's the way it is. And that's my choice. How is the world going to experience you right now where you are, where you're listening to my voice? I don't care if you're on a bus or train, you're at work, you're in a car. I don't know. It doesn't matter. In this next moment after this podcast episode, how's the world going to experience you? And what I mean by that is, say you're on a train, you're holding on to the pole or you're in your car holding on to your steering wheel, the people that are looking at you, how they're experiencing you. Are you concerned about what they think, or are you more concerned about saying, this is the beauty that I am? Are you going to smile? I know when I'm driving a car and I look into another car and I see somebody smiling, I go, all right, it's a wonderful thing.

Person's having a good time, they're feeling good.

It makes me happy. It makes me happy just thinking about that right now. When I'm on the train, I see somebody smiling, I always think to myself, wow, that's a beautiful smile, and boy, I hope they're in love. Have you ever thought about that? That instead of you being so caught up with everybody else, and when you're in that mental state, in that mind state, you don't smile. You sort of, you know, put— bury your neck inside your two shoulders and you try to hide. And yet the absolute opposite of when you want to make this huge effect on people is just be the inner self of you.

Smile.

You have superpowers. You have the power to affect everybody you see, everybody that sees you.

How's that?

Everybody that sees you throughout the day, people that don't know you, people that walk by you on the street. You have the power to affect their entire day and their life just by being you. You feel good.

Smile.

Walk proud. Bought a nice pair of shoes?

Walk prouder. You bought a nice bike and you're all excited because it's springtime?

Yeah, baby! Walk with a little dun, dun, dun. We want to experience you. But do not settle. Do not settle for this safe, life, this life of mediocrity, because that's what it is. You're not living— look, let me tell you something, man, hardcore, hardcore, all right?

You have a life and for years it's been working and you've done nothing extraordinary where you think to your friends like, oh yeah, you've done that, I did that too, I climbed that mountain, I climbed that too, I went there, you went there, oh cool, cool, cool. You done— you met all the standards of your friends. Let me tell you, if they're your friends, have they made you feel awkward? Have they put you in an uncomfortable situation? If If they have not, they're not your friends, all right? They're keeping you in check. A friend tells you to your face when you don't need it that you're wrong and that you need to check yourself, that you need to correct yourself. That's a friend. If you haven't had somebody do that to you in the last 24 hours— and let's put this way, let's give them some leeway— in the last 7 days, then you got to reflect Do you have any friends? You have acquaintances, you have people you've known probably from kindergarten, but how many of them are your friends? I'm serious. A friend should say, you know what, I've known you for a long time and you're better than what you are right now. I've known you for a long time and you should take care of—

you should get rid of that man or that woman that's in your life that's not bringing out the inner beauty in you.

I've known you for a long time. You should stop eating all that crap and you should lose some damn weight because I remember when you used to look fantastic and you were a lot happier. A friend puts it to your face. Let's reverse it and flip it.

When's the last time you were a friend to someone? When's the last time you went to someone and was honest with them and were a true friend? See, life— we all want to be this super amazing person with all these, uh, incredible moments and people liking us and all that, and that ain't gonna happen as long as you settle. You have got to experience life, and you experience life by making yourself uncomfortable, by doing things that you know that you need to do when you need to do it. And when you need to do it is right now. There is no hesitation, there is no delay. It is right now. You just do the damn thing. Okay, it's gonna cause complete chaos. Okay, it might be a fight. Okay, you'll be uncomfortable. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, enough freaking okay and just do the damn thing.

You spend more time thinking about it and trying to rationalize with some stupid reason.

Just do the damn thing.

It's gonna hurt, it's gonna be difficult, it's gonna be frustrating.

It's so worth it, man. It's so worth it. Put yourself out there and people will love you. If people— I had— I told you in another episode that if people envy you, that if people are jealous of you, if people criticize you, that is a compliment to you. Collect criticism. Remember, be you. Don't settle for mediocrity. Don't go 20 years with the same person, 30 years with the same person in your life, and everything's okay. You've been working with the same company for 20, 30 years, everything's okay. I get a promotion every couple of 5, 3 to 5 years, everything's okay. Everybody likes me. Everything's okay. Guess what? Nothing's okay. I've ran into so many people recently who are living this life, that they've gone now years of everything's okay, and when something's not okay, I'll get to it. Right now, why don't you just pinch yourself? Take your hand, pinch yourself a little bit. Feel the pain. Pinch. That's life. Life is now. Life is not okay. I mean, it should be okay. It should be fun, but it shouldn't be okay. When you get a hug, how was the hug?

It was okay.

When you meet somebody and they give you a kiss and you, ah, it was okay. Sad.

How sad that the best you could say is life's okay.

Life is wonderful. Life is sad. Life is emotional. Life is dynamic. It is not meant to be okay. Right now, wherever you are. Breathe in, breathe out. Okay, you felt your shoulders, you felt your chest. Breathe in, breathe out. Now you're alive, now you're centered. Be who you're meant to be. Make a mental decision and execute on it now. No delay, Nothing. Have the conversation with the person you should have been having that conversation with years ago. Now talk to that person at work that you should have talked to and tell them, I don't like the way you've been talking to me or treating me, and have that now. Pick up that catalog or pick up the phone or go to that website and apply or register for that course or that program or something that you know you should have done a long time ago. You do that. Now go put on those sneakers or go jump on that bike and go outside and go for, if not a run, go for a walk or bike ride or whatever. And you do that now. And most importantly is go to that damn cupboard, take all that damn junk food, put into a bag, throw it out and walk it to the garbage. And when you put into the garbage can, don't drop it, slam it in there, destroy it, crush it and say, never again. Because my moment is now. Right now. Life is now. All the amazing things happen right now, not later. Don't play it safe. We don't want you to play it safe.

We want you.

Go forth and spread beauty and light. Take my words and my intensity and let it drive you, not just for this moment, not for this day, but for the rest of your life. It's not okay to be okay, cuz then you're not okay. You are energized, you are intelligent, you are everything that we want to see and envy. So therefore, be it. Exist in that moment.

Drive yourself.

You got this. You got this. This is Thomas Anglero. I love you to death. I believe in you or I would not say these things, and I mean No pain. I am just motivating the inner you to meet the outer you. Until the next time.

Thank you for listening to that episode. If you want to contact me, you can contact me on my website at anglero.com. And you can also subscribe to the newsletter, or you can find me anywhere on social media with Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter. Thank you so much, and I hope to hear from you very soon.