why are you doing the “thing”
This week I hosted the first talk in the 2025 Keep Pursuing Series, and in my opinion, it went great!
I wrote a brand new talk. I executed on my plan to write a poem for the talk and then turn that poem into a song with a video. I had people attend, and ended it with a great open discussion with everyone there.
Success.
However, it would be easy to not look at this event as a success.
I gave my talk to seven people—and in this audience of seven was Ang, Roman, Silas, my dad, my mom, a good yoga buddy of mine, and Morgan, my videographer (Leo had soccer practice).
I think most people wouldn’t feel as good about the talk as I did because they would be too fixated on how many people showed up and who they were. We live in a societ focused on number of followers, streams, views, etc; more equals better.
Sometimes that is true.
Sometimes the most impactful work is done on a much smaller scale.
Of course, I’d love an audience of hundreds of engaged and excited people, but my goal for the 2025 series had nothing to do with how many people show up. That is an outcome I can’t control. Instead of spending a lot of time, energy, and money trying to get people to my talks, I decided that in 2025 all of my effort would go towards writing valuable talks, becoming a better presenter, and creating the poems and songs. Maybe in 2026 I’ll change my goal towards increasing the number in attendance, but for this year it’s all about making sure I write twelve talks, poems, and songs and continue to improve as a public speaker each month.
If that’s all I do this year, then the Keep Pursuing Series will be a massive success.
This week could have derailed my progress towards achieving this year’s goal–I could have easily bailed on the series after a small turnout heavily dominated by my family. Thankfully, I know why I’m doing the series, which allows me to genuinely appreciate each individual that came and participated in my talk.
And I’ll let you in on a secret…
We’ll see if I’m right in time, but I trust that by focusing on the twelve talks, poems, and songs, that the numbers will all work out and the audience will grow over time; by staying true to my goal—why I’m doing the “thing” — the rest will take care of itself.
When you commit to doing something, remember why you set out to do it and stay true to your “why”.
For those interested, I’ll be working over the weekend to get “authentic life” up on my YouTube channel and the LifeDesign+ podcast so you can check it out!
🎧 Listen to today's Note on the LifeDesign+ podcast.
See you tomorrow and keep pursuing,
JC
🦅 Some ways I might be able to help you live your authentic life:
🤝 One on Ones Let's hop on Zoom to do a guided meditation, a creative brainstorming session, or an overcoming an obstacle session.
📝 LifeDesign+ LifeDesign+ is rooted in the Kinder Institute of Life Planning’s EVOKE process, which is a five-step process to help discover what your authentic life looks like and begin to design a plan to bring that life to reality. It continues to incorporate the alignment of your spirit, mind, and body to ensure you evolve with your authentic life, as the authentic life is not a destination, it’s an evolution.
💸 AlignedLife+ AlignedLife+ (and the one-time engagement AlignedLife) takes LifeDesign+ to the next level by aligning your finances with your authentic life at RLS Wealth. For individuals looking for a financial advisor to help design and manage their financial plan while maintaining the alignment of spirit, mind, body, and money, AlignedLife+ was created specifically for you.
📈 LifeDesign+ for financial advisors LifeDesign+ for financial advisors mirrors the LifeDesign+ relationship, including the focus on the alignment of spirit, mind, and body, with an important distinction—once the plan for your authentic life has been designed, we shift our focus to integrating your new plan with your practice.
🤝 Outsourced life planning As your outsourced life planner, you bring me in to take your client through the Kinder Institute of Life Planning’s EVOKE process to help them better understand who they are, what they want their life to look like, and create a vision of this life for you to execute on the financial plan. Since you are their financial advisor, you will be a part of each of the meetings, so you understand the “why” behind your client’s new plan.
