True story, happened about 20 minutes ago.

The Big Fear Happened.

I’m working at my friend Scott Stearman’s cabin down in Green Mountain Falls, CO. I spend my days writing and creating and barely moving, with my pulse sitting below 50 beats per minute and my butt getting sore. I try to help things by going for runs. So today I hit the steep trails on the side of town for a quick 25 minute jaunt. Coming around a bend and leaping over a rock, a dog runs past me down the hill. No surprise, there are often people on the trail. I glance up the ridge to see the expected owner, and there sits mama bear. A quick glance back down and I see the ‘dog’ is the cub. I pause for a split second, glance up where mama hasn’t moved yet, and bolt downhill. It’s really steep and boulder strewn. A moment more and on my right is a big tree and a huge scuffle and baby bear is clawing up it. Crap! It had doubled back on me. Now I’m waiting for the thunder of mama to sound. Nothing, and I catch a trail down into the neighborhood and haul butt.

I share this because a couple weeks ago on the same trail, I veered too far left and if not for a tree to grab, I’d have fallen down the steep hillside. No impending death, but it would have been hurt. But as I kept down the trail, I thought…would I have fallen if not for the tree, or did I feel free to push the limit cause the tree was there?

Same with this bear encounter. Our recent new friend Joseph Chirlee from Kenya (he is our new U.S.A. 25k champion!) would not go run the trails by our house two weeks ago cause of his intense fear of bear. He’s from Africa…lions and snakes, go figure. So what happened with me just a bit ago?

• Myth? Is the whole thing about getting between a mama bear and her cub a myth? They don’t really care? Doubtful…
• Superman? Am I just that imposing of a speciman of a man that no bear would dare risk an encounter with me? I wish, but doubtful with my 6′, 155lb stature…
• Downhill? Is it true that bear can’t run downhill cause their front legs are short, so my tactic and running prowess saved me? That IS literally a myth…
• God? Do I have a protective hedge around me cause God has a plan and it didn’t include getting mauled by a bear today? Could be, but…
• Humans? Maybe bear have just learned that humans are the ones to fear? Just like the elk that I often chase who could mow me down like a twig fi they wanted, but scamper away like scared mice?

I do know that nobody in this county can recall the last time a bear actually hurt a human. Zero. Nada. There are only 23 reports of bear/human interaction in the entire state of Colorado since 1998. That’s just over 1.5 per year in a state with tons of people out on trails every day of the year.

Yet there are scores of folks who come here and even live here with fear of ‘bear attack’ out on the trail, and stay away from hiking much, or alone. Meanwhile, who knows how many miles I’ve run alone on the Rocky Mountain trails. Plenty of guys I know dig going out in remote areas and solo camping. They might have their food stolen at night by a bear, but that’s about the worst of it.

What’s the point? In pursuing our purpose and drastically altering the trajectory of our lives, FEARS keep people down. And here is the deal:

What you fear…probably WILL happen!

• You will have some financial struggle along the way, maybe intense!
• You will have some relational struggles, with your spouse or friends and family.
• You will suffer the disdain, ridicule or disapproval from various people.
• You will lose sleep to worries and anxieties.
• You will work harder than you expected, or even fathomed.
• You will miss the mark in your endeavor and have to adjust. Some call it failure, the rest of us call it a normal part of progress…
• You will go out on the trail alone and come between a mama bear and a cub.

The deal is, what you fear, isn’t so horrible. 

That’s just it. No pithy quote. You’ll just deal with it, get through it. You’ll survive. The tragedy is when we don’t go forward because we fear the worst instead of just expecting it and saying “The worst is a price I’m willing to pay for the sake of what I believe to be the best.”

When I sit around with my fellow free agents we share war stories. Not with pride, but with gratefulness. It makes where we are sweeter. And honestly, it does feel a bit valiant. If it was easy, well…it wouldn’t be that valuable! And I see these same people continue taking on bears in their life, more and more. Cause they now expect the bear and are OK with it.

What’s far worse is staying indoors with the door locked.

So picture what you fear. Make peace with it and go forth.

*Photo – bear in our backyard May 2011

If you’d rather hear the show where I expanded on this topic:

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Most people (I bet you) have taken some type of personality profile. DISC, Strengthsfinder, Myers Briggs and more. They are amazing tools, and they do a pretty good job of nailing some primary tendencies, weaknesses and strengths. I usually read them and am impressed at the insight. But the truth is often this…it’s not worth squat to your life.

Chances are you weren’t blown away. It didn’t result in some grand epiphany that rocked your world and you came to a screeching halt to further understand this new revelation and ponder how your life should radically change from here forth!

Why?

There’s more than one reason for all of us, and some of them are very personal. But to paint with a broad brush, we don’t change easily…

But we WANT more and better and truer. We spent our time reading and watching about and from people who have done something powerful. Found their strengths, and realigned their lives around working primarily from them.

“Knowledge is easy. Application is brutal.”

If you don’t know your strengths:

• Join Free Agent Academy and we’ll give you the DISC and Strengthsfinder tests as part of Ascent class,
• Visit www.Strengthleader.com and purchase online Strengths report,
• Go to Amazon and find somewhere around a million different variations and reports at any number of prices (please don’t, I’m just trying to make a point)

Your chances and propensity to apply what you learn to yourself, by yourself, are slim. The info is only valid within the full context of who you are, and you can’t achieve that contextual clarity alone. It’s just not possible.

The point? A key to your personal progress is understanding your strengths, and realigning your life around them so you’re working in them the majority of the time. You can do this in traditional employment, and most freely, self-employment.

Hear www.StrengthLeader.com guru Deb Ingino and I passionately dissect all this in today’s show:

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Free Agent Underground Show – “Just knowing your strengths is worthless”

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Online Youth Leadership Summit Event hosted by Deb Ingino

Thursday May 10th 8pm Eastern/7pm Central

During this webcast we will share strategies to help our teens ages 14-17 on these important topics:

• Self Image (Presented by Kary Oberbrunner, author of Your Secret Name)
• Stand Up and Be Counted (Anti bulllying message presented by Lisa Schaefer, a teacher, counselor and a hoot!)
• Personal Character (taught by 18 year old Holly Eisenhut the  youngest certified Coach on the John Maxwell Team, who even at her young age is an awesome role model)
• Failing Forward To Success (Presented by Trudy Menke, a dynamite speaker who ‘gets it’)
• Full info and registration: Online Youth Leadership Summit Event

From family business, to MLM and get-rich-quick ideas, to a ‘real job’, to…knowing there should be more and getting inspired. This is the story-in-progress of Brett Traudt. 39 years old, married, living in California and doing the work of discovering and pursuing purpose in his life.

Today finds him having launched three business ideas:

S’more Outdoor

• Camping service. Most people like to camp, few do it cause it’s such a hassle! Brett takes care of all the dirty work so you can just be inspired!

Soap Dock

• Does your soap leave it’s scum where you set it, and get stuck? Brett’s solved that.

Mountain Man Soap

• “Shave with your axe. Bathe with our soap.” Killer brand, and I (Kevin) am an avid customer!

Brett’s still employed at the j-o-b. And a success story. If success is not all about ‘arriving’, but about ‘being’. About the revelation, the desire, the commitment and doing the long, hard work.

What makes Brett different from others who want and believe in more? I’d say vision. It’s carried him forward all this time, and it’s getting clearer every day. And the clearer it gets, the easier it is to recognize the opportunities when they present themselves.

You’ll be blessed immensely by this true story.

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Free Agent Underground Show – “Camping, soap and life on purpose”

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So today I spent the morning writing out a blog that was on my head and heart to do the show on. But at lunch I met up with Justin Lukasavige and a friend of ours who was in town. John. He’s an aspiring free agent. Great guy. A friend and a peer. And to fully disclose, he’s a member at Free Agent Academy.

We talked about life and family…then got an update on where he is in his pursuit of free agency. He’s gotten significantly in touch with who he is. He knows what he enjoys. He has an idea for free agency (self-employment) that does a great job of fulfilling both. But here is where it gets real, and I bet you can relate in many ways:

• He’s 45 years old
• Married with kids in college
• Has a job that is OK and makes $150,000 per year
• Travels 2 weeks per month
• He and his wife have adjusted their lifestyle to that $11,000 (after taxes and insurance) per month income
• The job is just for a paycheck. Again, it doesn’t totally suck, but it has no purpose in his life other than the money it earns him
• On one hand, John feels he can’t continue in his life without working on something that connects with his heart
• On the other hand, when the work day and week is done, he doesn’t have the energy and motivation to do anything but rest…therefore not having the bandwidth to work on anything else

And there it rests…

I expanded on this topic in Wednesday’s show if you’d like to listen to it:


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Can you relate to any of that? Sure you can. And again folks, I know John. He’s a righteous guy who I admire and honor. A peer in life. We are all dealing with our flesh on one side and our spirit on the other. Ease on one side, hard work on the other. Safety on one side and purpose on the other.

So what are his options? What’s going to GIVE…

1. Die to his heart and just suck it up…be ‘responsible’ and normal and do the job and maintain his income and lifestyle and not make living for a purpose and a cause bigger than personal provision such a big focus
2. Risk his income
3. Make his life really hard by pushing himself to the brink to maintain his job AND pursue this other endeavor simultaneously?

When I built my house, I was told I’d need a surplus of one of these:

1. Money
2. Time
3. Know-how

I didn’t have enough money, had about zero know-how, so it was time that I utilized. For 9 months I lived at the building site in a 5th wheel RV for 4 days per week. That’s what it took to make it happen. At the end…we had our custom house on dream property, we moved in, and life went back to normal…albeit in a drastically different and better reality than where we’d been before. Additionally, that investment allowed up, two years later, to refinance and pay off all my old, bad business debt. But it took 9 months of ridiculous effort.

I have friends who still think I was nuts to attempt it. And they are right. Maybe. Or maybe…they are nuts for choosing safety and security and comfort and ease over a bigger and better and more worthwhile story. What do you think? Maybe the ‘norm’ is what is nuts and abnormal. Do you own any epic movies about someone who chose to play it safe? Then why do we choose to be inspired by stories and not our own lives?

We all have circumstances that make change challenging. But there is always someone who has it harder, that is doing more. We don’t really have relevant excuses. Just choices. My battle for better and healthier and more valuable is always against the comfort and appetite of my flesh, not real hardship.

So for you…what’s going to give? What MUST give? What do you choose? The ease and comfort of what you have now, even if it’s painful? Or the hard road to something new and much better? You’ll endure pain there, but the pain of striving for hope beats the hell out of the pain of despair. One leads to life, the other to death.

How does this hit you? Seem fair…or not?!

I hate it when a truth get’s lost in the shuffle, diluted or dissed. And I see so many folks getting soured and disillusioned with the constant influx of hype on:

• “Follow your passions!”
• “Find your calling!”
• “Know your purpose!”
• “Follow your dreams!”

Two days ago my friend Jeff Jones (drummer for Big Daddy Weave) sent me a blog from biz celebrity Mark Cuban titled “Don’t follow your passion, follow your effort”. He knew it would rile me up. Truthfully it just saddens me. If your goal is money and power and the American Dream and you’d rather not get into the introspective, meaningful, heart realities of existence, you’ll dig it. Otherwise, you may throw up a little in your mouth like I did.

Then yesterday my friend Jon Dale (co-founder of Moolala) posted a blog on Facebook from a friend of his, Aaron McHugh, titled “Passion and the probability of success”. It’s solid! But I fear too easy to discount in the sea of content on the subject.

Can we just be real together, you and me? Use some logic and common sense and dispel with the hype and overused verbiage?

Have you ever done something you were good at, but didn’t care about? How’d that go for you? Then, ever do something you truly cared about? Not something that was merely fun, but something you fervently believed in?

Look, for the sake of my family’s welfare, if their provision rides on it and you give me something I’m competent in to do, I’ll do it. I’ll work hard, do it well, get the job done, maybe even excel a bit. And for a good while. But there is a cost when your heart isn’t invested in the task that you do day in and day out over a long period of time. That is just truth. Other parts of me will decline and they will manifest in multiple ways, and my family will be affected by it. If you disagree, then share. State your case. But I’ve done a lot of things, and I’ve walked with countless numbers of people and I know of what I speak here.

You give me something I care about though? Something I believe in? I’ll endure hell to see it through, and though I may be tired at the end of the day, my heart, soul and mind will be inspired, alive and tireless! I’ll change the world and bring others with me.

Again…two tasks. One you care about, one you don’t. Which are you going to do better at over the long haul? It’s simple math.

Why then, except for a short spell if you’re in survival mode, would you devote yourself long term to a task you don’t care about?

Show me a current or historical person that has made the world a better place, inspired others to positive things, and been a true blessing in the lives of anyone…and I’ll show you someone who devoted themselves to a vocation they truly care about. Were ‘Passionate’ about. Felt ‘Called’ to. Found ‘Purpose’ in. Fulfilled the ‘Dream’ of their heart.

What say you?!

*Photo of Jon Dale and myself in the early Moolala offices. Jon cares about his work!

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Free Agent Underground Show – “Sick of Passions, Calling, Purpose, Dreams?”

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