For: the ambitious person figuring out how to lead, grow, and intentionally build a fulfilling life - one step up at time. From: someone on the journey too. Released every Thursday at 4:30pm CST.
đź‘Ł Step 53: If You Want To, You Will
👣 Step 53: If You Want To, You WillI’ve been thinking a lot about my future lately through multiple different means. Wedding planning with Ashley. Building my social media app (coming soon!). Growing with Goodwill. Wrapping up my 705 Presidency and looking for what’s next in community engagement and value creation. In thinking through these things, I’m very confident that I will create the lifestyle and impact that I want for my future. Not in a cocky way. In a “I can literally feel it and visualize it” kind of way. I’m confident, and I know it will happen. It’ll just take time. Why? Because I’ll take the actions to make sure it's a reality. In recent years, I’ve often found myself giving this piece of advice to my friends: if you want to, you will. It sounds very surface level, like “duh.” But think on it. A lot of people say they want a fit body, but they don’t stick to their diet or workout routine. A lot of people say they want to read more, but then never pick up a book. A lot of people say they want to reconnect with friends and catch up, but they never get something on the calendar. Their actions don’t line up with their words. They don’t really want to - they just say they do. If they did really want to, they would. Because they want to. If you want to, you will. The phrase is a good way to keep myself accountable to what I say I want. I say I want to run a sub-hour 10k this year, but are my actions lining up with that? Not entirely. I say I want to be semi-conversational in Cajun French by Christmas, but am I putting in enough practice? Not as much as I should. So, what does that say about what I actually want compared to what I say I want? If you want to, you will. It’s a phrase of affirmation, but also accountability. It shows that you can truly achieve the things you want to (within reason, limits of your control, and physics). But it also shines a light on whether your actions align with what you say. I talked to a friend recently about a leadership opportunity for her, and I gave her three questions to think it through:
She ended up taking the leadership opportunity because she really wants her goal, and she’s going to put in the effort to get it. That’s actions aligning with words. Don’t tell people you want something if you won’t put in the time and effort to get it. If you want to, you will. See you next Thursday, Steppers. We will succeed, Grayson ​graysonstepanek.com​ Song of the Week:
Why did I just now listen to this album after loving all other Bon Iver albums and listening to them hundreds of times? I have no clue. This album is phenomenal (didn't expect anything less), and this song made me long for a waterfall in the woods that I've never seen before. This is probably the song that plays when you're about to die and your whole life is flashing before your eyes. Justin is just insane. Next level artist. |
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Grayson Stepanek
For: the ambitious person figuring out how to lead, grow, and intentionally build a fulfilling life - one step up at time. From: someone on the journey too. Released every Thursday at 4:30pm CST.
đź‘Ł Step 58: Invisible Labor I'm a music lover. Always have been, always will be. One music award that's always stuck out in a weird way to me is the Grammy's "Best New Artist" award. Because those artists aren't new. They've been making music for years. They just became popular enough in the past 1-2 years for us to collectively view them as "new." But that's wrong, and it disregards a lot of their foundational, behind the scenes work that got them to that place. It disregards their invisible...
đź‘Ł Step 57: Prioritize, Then Prioritize Again Last Saturday, I ran the Courir a la Musique 8k and had a blast! Beautiful weather, amazing friends, a rich Cajun culture, and I actually hit my pace goal with 10:31. Even though I had fun and did pretty well, I wasn't nearly as trained as I planned to be. Over the past month, I've had to prioritize other things, and running just fell into the maintenance category. And that's okay. Prioritization has been a big thing for me the past few weeks, and...
đź‘Ł Step 56: Doing Nothing is Doing Something A few weeks ago, I talked about one of my mottos: "If you want to, you will." I want to note that the opposite is also true: "If you don't want to, you won't." The first form of the phrase denotes action. Doing. The second form denotes inaction. Not doing. But both are still action. And it is very important to truly understand that. As humans, we struggle understanding things that we can't see or measure. We understand when someone's broken a bone,...