@web smith

I’ll preface this message by thanking the family of Joanne and Anthony Cross, QC. Their distinguished family hosted my friends and me: Rob Orlando, Jeremy Thiel, Lisa Thiel, Carey Kepler, Elliot Schrock, Lindsey Schrock, and Nicole Hughes. Because of the Cross family, we traveled home to Lancashire, England to interact with some of the pioneering affiliates over there. Part One of my talk was: “I Know Nothing about Business” and Part Two was: “The Entrepreneurial Spirit, a.k.a “the hustle”. Here is the underlying message of part two.

Use all of your time. The lives that we cherish are much shorter than we could ever believe. Going through life as though you can operate with a 20 year plan is wrong, in my opinion. Businesses can operate with a 20 year plan. Individuals cannot. The reward goes to the person who not only keeps the ball rolling, but moves the ball quickest upon starting. Every business inspiration that I know wakes up frantic about what’s to be done rather than how to find ways for others to do it. I almost want to say Carpe Diem, but that would almost be too cliche.

Just days ago, I peered around the corner of my home office’s hallway to see my daughter dancing to classical music on the tile of the kitchen floor. She believes that she is a ballerina worthy of a stage, lights, and admirers. On the way over to hug her, the foundation of the house shook. Alexis continued to dance - numb to the instance - but the crash of metal and rubber led me to open the garage’s door on my right. It was late into the night but instead of watching television or decompressing from a demanding day at work, my wife was performing olympic lifts for 2012’s competition season. She winked as I opened the door to smile in admiration of her work ethic. Only in her world is it ok to athletically redline at 9 PM.                                                                                                

Everyone in my family was passionately preparing for their own individual futures. As for now, Alexis just wants to dance. Lindsey just wants to win. And I want them to feel a weightlessness, as though every other care is on my shoulders. And there was me, in my office, working towards my next steps towards “up” and “stability”.It was well into the night but the mood was still “Go. Now.” rather than “Slow down”. My home was in order for the night. 

We are living through an entrepreneurial revolution yet many of us don’t realize the difference between exceptionalism and acceptionalism. Acceptionalism is adverse to exceptionalism. We seek to be the exception, the people whose success ranges in the top 1%. But rather, our day to day actions communicate different intentions that communicates an acceptance of our circumstances. We lavish in 3 PM post-work recreation. We do this as though the momentum that drives our own self-reliance and entrepreneurialism ignores our real world actions. We tend to accept rather than except.  At times, we insult our own ambitions by relaxing our standards. It is confusing to the psyche and detrimental to the potency of your own ability to persist, to climb, to innovate, and to finish.  When it comes to “E” or “A”, you can’t have it both ways. 

Some people decry the mentality of the “Blue Sky Thinker”. They say that thinkers like them have dreams and self-expectations that aren’t grounded in reality. Some say that a dreamer’s work ethic is flawed because of his impatience or, worse, his naivete to the long-term demands and consequences of the pace that he chooses. But what you may not realize (or hopefully, you do realize this and you completely agree) is that if you want something bad enough - there is no “off” switch. Time away from your marathon causes performance anxiety.

A marathon is a distance, it isn’t a pace. The best runner in the world does so at a sustainably break neck speed, all for a chance to stand on the golden podium. In fact, the current world record holder ran 4 min 45 sec miles to win the Boston Marathon. Is this not a sprint? The preparation for the marathon was probably not great for his social life. The speed of the race that was likely temporarily detrimental to his health. But the man has the world record. Some will call you “blue sky thinkers”. While they offer their opinions on the likelihood of your success, just continue running. Go get your world record. And keep thinking with your head in the sky and your feet on the track.