Do this and change your life

You are listening to episode number 9. Thank you so much for joining us today. My goal with these conversations is to explore different types of people and their successes as well as their failures in navigating and mapping out their lives so that you too may have more insight in what it takes to build the life that you envision for yourself. I believe if you take action each day, the life that you want can be closer than you think. Welcome to Work That Out, guys. Your guide to connecting authentically, living with purpose, and having no regrets. This is the show that gives you real stories and real examples of people working it out and creating the life that they want. Today I want to talk to you guys about taking responsibility, right? So eventually we all have to accept total and full responsibility for all of our actions for everything we have done and for everything, all those things that we haven't done. That's a quote by Hubert Shelby Jr. So just to start off with, I've always been a person who, well, more recently in my life, who has learned to take responsibility for everything, right? So today we are at the end of June. Today is actually what, June 29th, right? So everybody's working from home. You know, I'm working from home with my life coaching business and my spouse is working from home, right? And so I've always been envious of this thing called a Varidesk, right? So she's over there working on— she's got this 48-inch monitor and then another 32-inch monitor, Mac computers. And every now and then, I hear the zzz, where the Varidesk is on it, clicks and locks into place. And so because I work mobile on a laptop mostly, so there are times when I'm sitting at the island, right? And I'll look over and there goes the desk up and down. And I feel like she's just showing off with that desk, right? And so I noticed that I started getting some upper back, some shoulder, and some neck pain, right? Because when you're just looking at the laptop all the time, generally the laptop is a little lower than, you know, looking right dead on at it. So I noticed that I started developing some neck pains and stuff. So I was like, well, I don't need a big fancy desk like that, but I'm gonna get me a desk. It may not be a VariDesk, but I'm gonna get me a desk because you know what? I wanna stand up and I'm gonna click it and lock it in a place too. Just like she does, right? So I've always been a little bit of an impulse buyer. You know, I, I was that person who, when infomercials were really big, that it was 2 in the morning, if I couldn't sleep, my credit card needed to be in a vault somewhere, you know, locked up under lock and key, because I would order some stuff. You know, I've ordered so much exercise equipment, you know, fitness, diet stuff that, you know, I ordered and it came in and then I was like, why did I even order this, right? So I've always been that person. So I slipped back into that habit. So this was mid-May, right? Mid-May, I was on Instagram. You know how all those ads sometimes pop up, right? So there was an ad for a mobile desk, baby. A mobile desk, right? Because I look over there and I look at the VariDesk, and I was like, I can get my own. And you know what? You know what's going to be better than that one? I can move my mobile desk wherever I go. Hers is stuck in some one spot, you know, with it over there in her office, you know. And so mine, I can take outside if I want. I can go to the front yard, the backyard, the patio, the office. I can sit on the island with it, and then I won't have any more neck pain. And then I can be playing the same game that she's over there playing, right? So I ordered— I, I came across something on Instagram, and You know, you know where this is going already, right? And so I clicked on it and I was like, yeah, you know, cool. You know, hers cost like $300, $400. Mine cost $45. Yes, baby. You see how I'm winning all over the place? I'm winning everywhere we go. So I'm like, click. I put it on my credit card information. I buy the desk, right? So I'm like, okay, it's just like Prime Amazon, like Amazon Prime. And so this thing is going to come in in the next couple of days. Well, I never heard from the people for like 3 weeks. Then I realized it was going to be shipped from China. So it's like, oh, okay, all right, but it's all good, it's all good. I'm glass half full. I see the light at the end of the tunnel. I'm still getting it. I don't need it right now. I can just, I can just stand up and raise it if I want, right? So then the time keeps ticking by. So then it, it finally left China. Then it sat at the LA International Airport for a week and a half. So I guess, you know, yeah, I just assumed somebody was walking it here, right? So this past Saturday, the FedEx truck pulls up and I was like, my desk is here, baby! Yeah, my desk is here! I'm so excited because remember, I want it to be mobile and it's going to be as good as the VariDesk, but I'm going to be able to move it from room to room, outside, back to all these things. So I was so excited about the desk, right? So then he dropped it off, I went out and I grabbed it, and I was able to pick it up with one hand, and it felt like just like it was a thick envelope, right? So already I'm feeling like, okay, I don't know what's going on with this. So I cut it open and this is what came in the package, right? Remember the desk that I thought was sturdy? Here we are. Looks like a food tray, right? Oh, and you know what? Oh, if you push the buttons here, look at that! What am I supposed to do with that, right? It's even missing the other legs that were supposed to come with it, right? So I was like, this looks like something that came from Southwest American Airlines, from the food tray that you pull out on an airplane. And oh, look at these little tabs that can stop your computer from flying. And look, it's already bent. What on earth am I supposed to do with this? And so when I— all I could do was laugh. All I could do was laugh at the decision that I had made and take responsibility for an impulse buy, for not really doing my homework as far as making sure that this was something that was going to be sturdy, that this was something that was going to be exactly what I needed. So it's fine. I have a better one coming. I've done a little bit of research and I know that this one's going to be better. And so what I would have done in the past was not taken responsibility for my actions I would have blamed the coronavirus, that it came from China, that it, you know, it was held up at the LA airport, that somebody probably took the legs from it, all these things, right? Because my imagination can run wild. So the first part of that is recognizing that I need to take responsibility because I made an impulse decision, right? And so, so many times in our life We don't take responsibility for all of the decisions and the choices that we've made in our life, right? Because you are exactly where you are in your life because of the consequences of the choices that you've made in your life. And I know we all have a tendency— I know I have— to blame others. I am where I am because so-and-so didn't do something, because so-and-so did something, and I was at the other end of that, that spectrum. Because something didn't pan out, but we always have a tendency to blame a circumstance, an experience, our upbringing, our parents, our family, our friends, whatever that is. But we all have a choice to take responsibility. We all have a choice to react to things differently and own up to it, right? Because life is— 10% of what happens to you, like all these things that happen to you, and 90% of how you react to it. So every day that you get up, there is a choice. You have a choice in all of your relationships, right? Because we know everybody likes the sense of, you know, having reciprocity in the relationships. You know, that if I'm gonna call and hang out with my friends and they're gonna do the exact same thing, it's 50/50. But you know what, in relationships, if you are the kind of person who is leading from an unselfish place where you are just thinking about improving someone else's life, adding value to someone else's life, all of those things just begin to fall in place and your relationships are much better. But so many times, you know, in romantic relationships and friendships, it's because, well, she said this and he won't do this, and I'm not going to kiss him at night until he does this because she got What is that? So if we just take responsibility for our actions every single day, everything that we're thinking, all of our behaviors, all the looks we're giving, all the looks we're not giving, all the stank faces, you know, if we just took responsibility for how we want to interact with people, how we want to interact with ourselves and our lives, and really taking the bull by the horns, that if it's to be, it's up to me, right? And so what can you start taking responsibility for in your life? How can you step out— and when I say you, I mean myself as well— how can you step out of playing the victim, out of that victim mindset, and start putting your life on a totally different career path, right? Taking the bull by the horns and saying, you know what, I have the power to do anything that I want to do in my life. I have the power to create greatness. I have the power to not get triggered by something. I have the power to get up and start on something that's going to change my life in next week. 90 days, you know, next year. Every single thing that you do, every single thing that I do, is a choice. And the choices that we make each and every day, and the choices that we have made, that you have made, have brought you to this exact place in your life. And sometimes we're not proud of those choices, we're not proud of those decisions, But they're still our choices and our decisions that we've made. So to move forward out of this, it's not in a sense of going back and reanalyzing it and going, "Oh my goodness," you know, we're hoping that we've learned something from those choices and decisions. But now it's time to look ahead and go, "Okay, I can't control what happened in the past," right? Because when we're thinking about everything that happened in the past, that leads to we're feeling bad about ourselves, that leads to depression, And then when you start thinking so much in the future and we get anxious and we get nervous, and that leads to a lot of the anxiety because we just let our minds go wild and it's like, what if this happens? What if that happens? Well, that's anxiety, right? So if we just keep ourselves right here in the present, this is all we have control of. So what is a choice that you can make right now today, that I can make right now today? That's gonna put you on the path to achieving the life of your dreams, a life on your terms, designing every single day the life that you want to live? How can you start taking responsibility today? All right guys, thank you so much for listening. If you want to know more about what I'm up to, head over to traviesteward.com. Com. If you like seeing the videos of the podcast, every episode is on my YouTube channel. And if you like what you hear, please do me a favor and subscribe to the show. And remember, life is about connecting authentically, living with purpose, and having no regrets.