Super stressful, crazy, but Blessed week….
So I found a new place! I am a Huge fan of Matt Chandler’s preaching (feed://feeds.feedburner.com/TVCSermonAudio) and one of the things he always talks about is how people in the church get married after being single for years, the whole time living by themselves only to find out that living day in and day out with another person is extremely difficult. He is a big time proponent of single dudes having roommates to prepare themselves for living with their future spouse. I Completely Agree! with this idea. The whole time I lived in Dallas I was living by myself and my ability to resolve conflict and my ability to be selfless sucked in a big way. Being a bouncer and cracking skulls at will didn’t really help my ability to properly “resolve conflict” with other people either, seriously. Point is I made a conscious choice to live with roommates here in Denver and work towards being a better “housemate/roommate” with the full intention of someday being a better husband! Well obviously I will not live in a druggie environment with a dude that needs to get his skull cracked and have some serious sense knocked into him! Which I had to hold myself back from doing after his behavior on my last night there…so I am so glad to report that I am free of that chaos:) I have found a Great place to live in SE Denver! I live in a house full of working male and female professionals who are all here for different reasons and we all respect each other and our individual lives and spaces, very cool. I’m really looking forward to growing out of this experience. It’s also really neat to be able to get to know people outside of my fighting/fitness/bouncer world too!
I have been absent all week b/c I have been studying day and night and will continue to do so until I take another stupid and pointless personal training certification next week. The gym I will be working at will only take this certain certification. Jumping through hoops all in the name of being able to pay my bills so I can build my school up slowly but surely is not always fun but such is life;) Btw I have passed 4 of these dumb things but just never kept them current so here I am getting a new one…..sometimes we never learn, hahahaha!
I want to Thank ALL of the people that have supported me this week via this Blog, my Animal page of FB, FB private messages, texts, calls, emails, gift cards for Chips/Queso/Brew (thanks Broham, that really really hit the emotional spot today in a Blessed and Amazing way:)
Looking forward to getting back on that mat and getting my roll on…I enjoy lifting weights but nothing quite satisfies my soul like cracking skulls on a mat:)
Thank You All!!!
First bump in the road….
“Nothing easy is worth having”…hhhhhmmmmm…well I want to change that to “It won’t be hard, there are just annoying things you have to go through along the way”. Point is I hit my first major road block in the realization of my goal of having my own Jiu Jitsu school. The reason I changed the saying is b/c I am choosing to focus on how this isn’t a “problem” or this situation isn’t a “hard” one, it is just an annoying bump in the road along the road to success:) Right now it is a matter of perspective! and NO I am not into the “be positive all the time so as to attract positive people and/or situations”…this is just me choosing to live my life day by day and not letting a bad situation bring me down or slow me down AT ALL!!! I just get sick of hearing people drone on and on about how life is so positive b/c they are choosing to put out positive thoughts and energy out there…that is a load of BS. Life is hard and has its ups and downs and this is just one of those down times and situations and there is always tomorrow to live for and I am Blessed to even have what I have!!! so with all that in mind I am just choosing to not let this keep me down:)
The situation is that I live in a house with 2 roommates, one of them cool, the other is a complete drug addicted loser! The roommate loser is 34, is still in junior college, waiting tables at a pizza place, and more importantly is a complete drug addict. This is one of my roommates. So long story short it is inconceivable that I will allow my world to have drug addicts in it, so I have to move out, and fast! I was only living in my place for a week and have had enough of the lying from the roommate, the endless stream of random people coming in and out of the place I live, and basically worrying that something really bad might happen. This is an EXTREMELY annoying thing to deal with b/c I have to spend hours out of my life looking for another place to live and have to do this quickly but like I said I am choosing to take this as a challenge and move forward:)
What makes this all the more difficult is that I only have 10 days to take another stupid personal trainer certification. I have to pass another one b/c I let my other ones lapse since I owned my own gym and I did and still do think personal training certifications are dumb…but here I am paying for my mistake! So upward and onward, time to pass this test and find a new place to live. Wish I had some positive stuff to report here but it’s been a pretty rough few days.
I do have to say I am 100% convinced that I am in the right place and doing the right thing and I know this will all pay off someday, sooner or later doesn’t matter b/c I don’t quit!
Got a JOB here in Denver…
So it looks like I really don’t understand the world of unemployment very well b/c as soon as I pulled into town here I was only unemployed for 2 days. Getting this job wasn’t something that “just happened”…I spent weeks prepping for my move up here (weeks but not months!) I should have planned for months but that wasn’t in the cards for this guy so I worked as hard as I could in the time frame alloted. Point is I was talking to people here all the time before I moved up, I was setting up interviews and asking around about where I could work and what my experience is and how I could fit into a gym/microbrewery/basically anywhere I could work for a paycheck:) It paid off and I had my first in person interview the day after I pulled into town, as well as several other phone interviews that day:) I will be a personal trainer at 24 Hour Fitness in Highlands Ranch which is a South East suburb of Denver, it’s a very nice area so I look forward to working a LOT. The first thing any small business absolutely needs to start up is for the entrepreneur to have a job so he can put a roof over his head and food on the table…well I now have that here in Denver! I am Blessed beyond measure!!! I celebrated yesterday by trying my first locally Brewed Amazing Beer and it was Awesome!!! I also purchased the book “How We Decide” by Johah Lehrer. It’s a book about how neuroscience and behavioral economics help us understand people decision making, basically the why and how people choose something…it’s gonna ROCK!!! So there ya have it…my first success in Denver, Colorado:) Btw I LOVE it here!!! The weather tells me everyday how Awesome of a decision I made by moving here. I am also Pumped about getting up into the mountains and seeing snow and climbing those crazy things called mountains:) Thank You all for your continued support!!! I can’t tell you in words how all the messages via text, email, Facebook, etc have Blessed me and my work up here….so keep keeping it real all you peps in the Blogshere and I will see/write ya soon…
First night in Denver…
So I MADE IT!!! I pulled into my place this morning at 10am and unpacked a few things and then slept until 4:30 and boy did I need it! So far I’ve unpacked most of my stuff and put some stuff in the right place in the house, but I still have a long ways to go until I get completely settled in. I have an interview tomorrow at a large gym and a couple other opportunities this week as well so really looking forward to that! It’s GREAT here too b/c it is already getting colder here and I am sooooooo sick of the heat and the weather in general in Texas. Texas is an Awesome state for a lot of reasons but man the weather is Horrible! Thank You for your support here and please keep me in your Prayers b/c I gotta get me one of those fandangled things called a job to pay my bills until I get my own school up and running:)
Time for the last leg of the journey…
Here we go….just got done with some Amazing Praise & Worship & Sermon at the local downtown coffee house in Wichita, Kansas:) http://www.meadscorner.com/meads Been an AWESOME week of reflection and checking of my motivations and my Heart to see what is at the core of me and my reasoning in doing what I am doing. I got to have some time where I was stripped of all my “normal” activities, which apparently aren’t that normal after all…haha! But seriously I got to have some great gut-check time and some time to really dig into what I am doing here. For those of you that don’t know my background this is my second business related to Fitness. I opened up a 1,200 square foot personal training studio in the heart of Seattle, Washington about 6 six years ago. It was called “Animal Fitness Systems” and it was a Blast and it did Awesome for about 2 years. It ultimately failed due to a combination of my laziness/inept at business and the economy in 2009 in the Northwest (which was straight horrible!) I started that company with a dream, credit cards, and some of the best friends/clients/AFS ButtKickers a person could be Blessed with. It was the Best learning experience for “how to start and fail” at a new business….hahaha! It was a whirlwind, I tell you that much:) I got to train and get to know some of the most Amazing people on this planet and got paid to do it so I was one happy Animal:) I write this b/c I want people to know that I am familiar with the ups and downs of business and the pro’s and con’s of what I am doing right now. This week has been one of those “gut-check” times where I sat back and really really reevaluated what I was doing and ultimately if I was ready to do this crazy entrepreneurship thing again! I will detail later in this Blog how and why I literally have no choice but to do what I am doing…NOT to be confused with “I am doing this b/c I don’t want to” BUT the truth is that I am doing this b/c it is literally in my blood/DNA and my Calling in this life is to “go forth and create” something from nothing:)!!! I just happen to like fighting and intense exercise/sport so here I go… I want to Thank everyone sooooooooo much for Helping & Supporting me on this path b/c without you I would not be able to do any of this! You know who you are out there:) Please feel free to comment on this Blog and also tell a friend about what I am doing here so we can get more peps on board this crazy thing called “American Entrepreneurship”….Thanks Again!!!
Heading to Denver tomorrow night….
Looks like I’ll be driving to Denver around 9:00pm! Gonna drive through the night so I can avoid the sun and traffic:) Time to get started on my life up there Baby!!!
Been hanging in Wichita, Kansas Baby…
So here I am…feeling better, rested, and like my life batteries have been charged! I drove straight from Dallas, TX to Wichita, Kansas 5 days ago and have been chilling here ever since:) I’ll tell you what, this trip/move has been an exercise in faith and “giving up” of all the things that keep me feeling “normal” like rolling, lifting, being in my own home, my regular routine, etc. This move has showed me that I need to rely on Jesus more for comfort and not my “go to” comforts that help me stabilize and feel “normal”. I am so Blessed to have my health, people who truly love/care for me, and a future that I am extremely excited about BUT when a person is completely out of their routine and natural element, it gets stressful very quick. I have been staying on the sofa of my dear friend Marcheta here in Wichita and am Blessed beyond measure to have a place to lay my head and a friend to hang with while I am here. I have also had to put my hope and faith even more in my Lord b/c I have not had all the comforts of home. This is something that has been extremely unnerving but has taught me so much in my week of travel:) I am looking forward to growing more and seeing where I will be in 6 and 12 months from now…in snowy mountains so it is impossible to be bad;)
The night of the drive…
Getting ready to hit the road…
So the nervousness and “WHAT AM I DOING” is setting in….
Anybody that says it’s easy to start over in a new city, especially with the expressed goal of starting a business, is straight up Crazy! I was talking to my Brother today as I was having a mild freak-out session about what I’m doing and he asked me if I feel “called” to what I am am doing….Great question by the way Broham! and the answer is Yes! although I doubt my “normalcy” enough to answer that questions without being honest enough that admit I fear I might be wrong b/c I don’t tend to make extremely rational decisions all the time. Point it Yes I feel I am called and directed towards this profession of teaching/fighting and I most definitely know I am not supposed to stay in Dallas but exactly where I go and the circumstances of me leaving here to venture out on my own are freaky enough for me to give serious pause. I know in my Heart that I am making the correct decision but it is still something I doubt. I have read a LOT about men climbing mountains and the thing I remember most is the response a lot of them gave when they were asked “are you scared of what might happen up there” and their answers varied but the common theme in all of their answers was “fear is not a reason not to take up a challenge” It is one thing to fear something yet it is a completely different thing to give into that fear and not attempt the task at hand at all…that is the definition of cowardice. I remember vividly this same feeling before my MMA fight, a “what am I doing here” was going through my mind, even though I very much wanted to be there and fighting. It was almost the same feeling I am having now. I know my goals, I know my ability to achieve those goals, but I also know how hard the road will be. So here I am starting on my quest with Excitement & Reservations all mixed up into one huge emotional ball resulting in me just saying…”here we go…let’s do this!”
Sooooo much to do…
I forget how much moving sucks! It’s funny b/c everybody keeps asking me “why are you leaving Dallas” b/c I have so many good people and so many opportunities here to grow a school off of the people and students I have here already. The easiest answer is: I HATE heat!!! and I LOVE Mountains:) I’ve been going to Colorado my whole life, my Grandparents have a house up there in Glenwood Springs and I learned how to fall in love with snow and cold weather there and in Michigan, which is where I spent at least 1/4 of my childhood. My dad’s side of the family is from all over Michigan. I specifically remember as a child being outside in the freezing cold and not wanting to go inside. That is odd behavior I know but it’s what my body and soul were more comfortable with. When it used to pour rain in Seattle, WA and I would walk outside into a dark and rainy day at 10am I would just look outside and say “Thank God it’s not Texas heat” and be happy. I will have to completely start over in Denver and that will be EXTREMELY difficult but well worth it:) So Colorado here I come….
Animal Jiu Jitsu 