"I Did It": Are You Chasing The Wrong Things?

We may achieve our goals, but if our ladder is one someone else's wall, than that is the ultimate failure. This episode we'll uncover how to get clear about the thing that really matter to you.

Watch the live video by visiting www.donnyraus.com/blog.

Transcript

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Most people spend their entire lives stressed without ever giving a single thought as to what it is they really want and what's important. I used to live the way the comfort job and I hate it. As a result, I am my little coffee company. I'm just coffee company. You do live a life that you live. But it's starting to be clearly. It starts completely listening to the host, Donnie Rouse. You're listening to the podcast. One life. Ladders meaning your goals. What if you were to get to the end of your life only to realize that you were placing your ladder on someone else's wall? This is the ultimate failure to arrive at the end only to be unfulfilled and not get all the satisfaction of achieving the goal because you were aiming for the wrong thing. So it is imperative whenever you think about a life that's fulfilled, it's imperative to have a vision of something forward-looking. Because by having something forward-looking, it is the pull that moves you forward, that keeps you, that keeps you going even in times of hardship. The imagination is so much more potent than your willpower. That's a quote by Tony Robbins. I was just looking at one of my Pinterest inspiration walls, and that quote actually jumped out at me, and it's perfectly aligned with today's message that I want to share with you today. So as I was mentioning about goals, like what are your goals? Do you know? Do you have any clarity on those goals? If you don't, those goals are directly related, or your clarity or lack thereof are directly related to the motivation that you feel every single day. Sometimes we may have a goal, we may have a clear sense of what it is that we want, but it's because we we look at it once every year, typically around New Year's, that it just the picture is dim, it's blurry, and it's faded. But what would happen if you were to illuminate that photo? What would happen if not only you illuminate, let's just let's pretend that sometimes, and this is not really a stretch, but sometimes we get our goals from the external world around us. We look to what our neighbor has, we look to what this influencer is achieving, and we're like, you know what, I want that. But sometimes we we take on things that are not meant to be ours. And so I want to share this today. Uh, this was, I'm always asking, I'm trying to, I'm always trying to look to see, to get more clarity as to what I want for my life. And the reason I do that is because I believe that life is meant to be lived with passion, joy, and excitement. And I want to approach my days with a sense of uh, as I said, excitement. I want to go into my days just feeling completely filled and completely uh steeped, so to speak, throwing that coffee pot in there, steeped into my day. And so I thought by coming on here and sharing just one of the biggest takeaways I had of probably this one of this this past week, that it may help you get some more clarity on what that grander vision is and what goals will really resonate with you at your heart, not from the environment. As I've been typically doing, I look at before in the morning and the evening, sometimes for 10 minutes, other times for 30 seconds. I look at my ambitions. I I put my mind to where it is that I want to go. One night I was I was sitting in my um, not even sitting, I was kneeling on my yoga mat, and that's this is where I normally do my meditation. So I was kneeling on my yoga mat and I was just thinking about the ambitions, like, what do I want for my life? Anytime I do this, I often feel vague answers come in. Like I might be like, oh, I want to travel, oh I don't know where I want to travel. Oh, I want to have a freedom, you know, my business allow me the freedom. Ah, but I don't even know what that looks like. And so I spend this time kind of like jump roping in my mind, not really sure of what it is that I really, really desire. And then I remembered I was on a workshop uh on a call, and the person who was presenting was talking about, he was an author, and he was talking about his goals and how he was also a watch lover, what he would do would he would he would make a he would set a goal. And then when he achieved that goal, he would go out and buy a particular watch that he wanted to celebrate it. He was getting ready to publish his next book, and I think it was a conversation with his wife. His wife was like, Well, what are you gonna get? Are you gonna finally get that Cartier watch that you had been wanting? And he thought about it, and he ended up getting the watch, and he got something engraved on the watch that stuck with me. And this was something that other entrepreneurs had mentioned as well, which is why it why it came back into my mind because I had heard it often. And if you're a watch collector, you know that the one thing you do not do is you do not inscribe your watch. Otherwise, it's worth it, does it it really, really takes away from the value when you try to sell it or resell it. So he inscribed his watch with the words, I did it. He realized that the goal, the the words, I did it, the goal was something that he is an offer, the watch was something to celebrate, but nothing beat the satisfaction of saying that he did it, that he chose a worthwhile goal, something that was going to fulfill him and get him satisfaction in life. So as I was sitting on my yoga mat, I was thinking about my my goals for my for my own life. And I said, well, what can I look back if I were looking back at my life? What would I have to do to say, to give me the satisfaction of saying, I did it? This is very similar to the what they call, uh they call the rocking chair test, where you imagine yourself at the end of your life sitting in a rocking chair, maybe talking to your grandkids or something. And you you say and you look back and you're telling them about your life, and you're looking back and you're accounting all the things that you did that you're you're very proud of and gave you a lot of joy and fulfillment. Very similar. So when I looked at the things and said, like, well, I did it, the thing that one of the first things that came to my mind was a lifestyle of freedom, meaning a lifestyle where I am traveling around the world. Specifically in my mind, I was thinking about Europe, moving around Europe and living in Europe, while using my coffee brand to spread inform uh inspiration and making coffee content. After that, all of a sudden it started to grow into cafes, then I started thinking about my Cold Roman espresso expansion, which was kind of odd. I wasn't expecting that because for uh to be honest, like the the Cold Roman, doing that in my career was one of the hardest, uh probably one of the hardest endeavors because it seems like every time I would take a step forward, I would get two steps back. And really, that's just how I was framing it in my mind. Really, I would learn something. I'm like, okay, that's not gonna work. That means I have to take a new approach. But it's been this constant like this um this like forward motion and backward motion, learning what those steps are. But in when I was saying like what it is that I did, I imagined myself like literally arms up in the air as if I had just accomplished a major feat. And that was something that else came to mind. So the reason I want to share this with you is because just by asking a different question, all of a sudden I got a lot more clarity in what it was that I wanted to accomplish in life. One of the reasons, probably why I just booked a trip. One of my other major goals was to know that I visited every country. And and having that desire, having that goal means I have to do a lot of traveling in the next 20 years. And I'm hopefully it won't take that long because 20 years, I'm 45, gonna be 45 now, 65, it's still a good age. But I I have a lot of ground to cover. Uh, so I just booked another trip. But the the reason I tell you this is that I had gotten a lot more clarity and I had gotten all the feelings that I wanted just by asking a different question. When I was trying to look at what I wanted, the the vision I had for my future, it was just very vague. It was very um very blurry, so to speak. And I have I had written things down in the past. I would, whenever I'd get inspiration, I would write it down. But sometimes I look at the paper and it just doesn't have the same like zip that it had previously, especially if I am just trying to remember it off the top of my mind, and then I might as well not even do it at the exercise at all. But when I did this exercise that I did it, all of a sudden now it just added a palette of like color to all of the images of my mind. I started thinking about my espresso, the experience I want to have and create with my espresso, both in the actual blend and the roasting of the blend itself, as well as how other people enjoyed my espresso. So all of these things came to mind. So I also started bringing this. So what else does this question give you? So it's not just limited to those big things in your life, but you can use this question in your day-to-day. When I wake up in the morning, I ask myself a series of questions. First question I ask myself is what can I get excited about today? The second question, in no in no specific order, one of the other questions I ask is, How do I want to be guided? And you can say, well, why ask that question by saying, How do I want to be guided? I'm putting my focus on the exact areas where I want to see the uh the guidance, the cues, meaning um part of it is I I do believe that part of it is guidance from uh from God, from higher power, but also just paying attention to my own thoughts and where my own thoughts and my heart is is pulling me. And then the other one is what would make it feel like I what would make me feel like I did it today? Like what are the accomplishments I want to feel in my day that would give me that sense of I did it? And then I think of some of those and I capture them not so much on paper, but just in my mind while I'm doing brushing my teeth, shaving, or washing my face. And what that does is it just sets me on a trajectory, how it helps, yeah, can't even speak. It helps me start to envision the outcomes I want in my day. And as a result, envision them. I am more likely to move towards her and accomplish those. So let me ask you a question. Get out a journal in a piece of paper in a pen. And if you want, brew your cup of rouse coffee. And let me ask you one question. And I want you to really sit down and think about this. What would give you the sense of satisfaction to say, I did it? You can break this down into the one grand light vision, but it may also help to think about this in the several areas of your life. You may want to look at your career. Like, what would give you the sense of I did it in your career? Is it starting your own business? Is it growing or achieving a certain position within the company? What would give you that sense of I did it? How about for your family life? Is it seeing your family, giving them an experience? Is it seeing everyone happy and joyful together? Sunday dinners every every week. And because you've you've set this up, everyone is so much closer. What is the identity for your love life? For your significant other? And what is the identity for the life experiences you want to have? As I mentioned before, it you can do it as a grand vision for your life, but you can also break it down to the day. What are your wins? What do you what do you want to say I did it for? Like I what would give you a big I did it for today? At any moment you could plan to completely change the way your day is going by realigning your focus to what really matters. Now, if you feel like maybe uh this there's like a vagueness in here, if you feel like maybe you feel anxious because you're like, ah, I can't think, I can't think of anything. And I I've been there, I actually go in there quite a lot, where sometimes I'm trying to push my mind to come up with answers to something that is just it's not allowing me to do because I'm trying to force it. But what I've realized was that just by keep asking the question and being okay with not getting answers right away, just by keep asking the question, all of a sudden, once the mind has had some time to just to slow down, to just be still, all of a sudden the answers flood in. So again, if you have a few moments today, not even if you have, you get what you take action towards. You get what you're willing to commit to. The important things in our life, whatever they may be, are important because we are choosing to put our time and attention there. So my my intention for you is just to be happy with where you're putting your attention and really to focus that attention into the things that really matter to you that are gonna move your life in a direction that you're gonna be happy with looking back at the end of your day, at the end of your days when you're sitting on that deathbed. A little bit morbid, but when you're sitting on that deathbed, looking back and realize you lived one hell of a life, and there's not one single thing that you regret that you can go happy. That's how I want to go. So take the time, write these things down. If they don't come right away, keep asking the question, and when the inspiration hits, capture it. I hope you enjoyed this episode here. I hope it gives you a little bit more clarity as the different areas of your life, and it was maybe it gives you some clarity just to realize that you were focusing on something that you don't want, that society has told you what do we want. And if that is the case, that is a celebration. It is a celebration to realize that you were putting your attention to something that was not aligned with what your heart wants. So this way now you could take actions and you could correct. I hope you enjoyed this episode here, guys. If you did, please hit it that thumbs up, hit that subscribe button. And uh again, I'm Donnie Rouse. Thank you guys so much for tuning in. Remember, you only get one life. Live fully, live passionately, and most of all, live now. God bless you guys, and I will see you again soon.