Blind Self-Made Multi-Millionaire Proves You Can Overcome Any Obstacle | Raw Impact

You know, we we have this experience that, you know, sight is is truth, right? Seeing is believing, we say. And you know, you open your eyes, there's the world, it's immediate, it's passive, and it's it's reality. Uh, well, the experience that I had sort of progressing progressively losing my sight from about 13 to about age 25, uh, really shattered that illusion for me. Uh, and I literally saw firsthand that, uh, sight, this this magical experience of sight, far from objective truth or, you know, external reality, it's this personal virtual reality we create for ourselves. That implicates, uh, our memories, opinions, emotions, our conceptual understanding of the world, all sorts of things. And and yet we experience it sort of passively as this direct representation of the world. And that really was, uh, if you'll pardon the pun, an eye-opening, uh, realization for me. Uh, that led to this this vision that I have, cuz sight is really just one way, right, that we shape the realities we experience. We we create, uh, our own worlds in many other ways, really in every way. And and having the opportunity to to literally see that firsthand, as I lost my sight, you know, turned out to be uh, really one of the best things that ever happened to me in my life. The value in this this this eyes-wide-open vision, you know, that I speak of is is, you know, it's it's not about sight, it's not about blindness. It's it's about the lessons we can take, uh, you know, in in really taking control over the reality we want for ourselves. Literally choosing uh, who you want to be and how you want to live your life, uh, in any in any moment, right? So, uh, yes, we do this with sight, but we do it with the uh, self-limiting assumptions we make about ourselves. This critic in our minds, you know, it's that that nasty voice that uh, is quick to pass judgment, to tell us what we can't do, uh, you know, to keep us off the field, to tell us what others are thinking and saying about us, right? And, uh, the way this sort of critic can be so effective, so powerful in in in in kind of dominating our lives, uh, in in my experience is by, uh, through an insistence on perfection, right, which is impossible. Right, but because there's the critic insists upon perfection, which essentially guarantees your failure. Uh through comparison, relative merit, right? That critic will compare you to anybody, right? Real or imagined from any era. You know, and the critic will swap out, you know, different definitions of success or value or purpose or, you know, for your own and, you know, you won't even notice it. So, uh you know, the critic and of course this comes from Teddy Roosevelt's, you know, brilliant remarks about the critic and the strong man. The critic for me really is sort of that embodiment of uh you know, again, our fear of failure, you know, our our our own worst enemy in our minds. Uh Roosevelt's strong man, on the other hand, you know, is is someone who has no use for perfection, right? Only progress, right? Someone who values effort and growth, right? Whose focus is the is momentum, right? The next step. Not this overarching enterprise, this overwhelming endeavor, but what is my next step? And, you know, for the strong man, uh success lies in in in striving, in actually striving, right? Towards a noble pursuit, which at the end of the day is the only thing we can control, right? Uh whether or not uh we are striving to our best toward a noble pursuit. You know, you make a big decision and, you know, later it either works out phenomenally well or is a catastrophic failure. Well, it's so tempting in the face of the catastrophic failure to go back and beat yourself up and say, "Oh, this is the worst decision and I'm an idiot and this was terrible." And likewise, in the face of uh of great success, it's very easy for people to tell themselves, "Well, man, I must have been a genius, right? I'm the smartest guy there is." And uh just as a law of uh of physics, right? As a as a as a as a as a proposition of logic, that can't be true. It It cannot be that subsequent events, you know, determine the the the quality of actions you make, decisions you make, conversations you have, you know, behaviors you exhibit. You have to assess those things from the perspective of uh you know, the time in which they take place. We are uh you know, so often our own worst enemies, right? We we keep ourselves uh you know, off the stage, you know, for fear of bad reviews. And don't even realize that, you know, in the process we're, you know, forgetting how to dance and losing the joy in life, right? And it's just such a shame. You know, for me, that first step of the strongman to me kind of conveys and encompasses, you know, sort of victory over that critic, right? That's where you've said, "Look, maybe this is crazy, maybe it's not, maybe, you know, maybe everybody thinks I'm, you know, way off base here, whatever." All the what ifs, all the, you know, why not, why I should, why I should, whatever. I put all that aside. And I have committed to, you know, enter the arena. And that is the defining moment, I think, for the strongman. And what I I think when we're honest with ourselves and when we start to recognize significance in in moments like that in our lives, when we start to say, "Well, if I did this, it would be it's a big move, right?" And it doesn't have to be a huge move financially or economically or even, you know, it doesn't have to make sense to anyone else why it's a big move. It's a big move for you. It's important to pay attention to those feelings because often that's that's the strongman inside trying to tell you, "We can do this." You know, we let's get over this, you know, our fears, let's get over our, you know, our self-doubt, and let's let's do this. Everything's a choice. Every moment of your life is a choice. How do you want to spend that moment? Who do you want to be? It is not the circumstances we confront that dictate the lives we experience. It just cannot be. There are counterexamples all over the place. I'm just a blind guy, like that's no big deal, but, you know, you think about the prison prisoners of war who endured the most unspeakable of you know, of human atrocities. Nazi concentration camp survivors and on and on and on and you you find examples of remarkable people who, despite these circumstances, make a choice to find purpose in life, to find joy, to be a source of strength for others in their lives. And, you know, these these shining folks, you know, again, to my mind, prove categorically it's not the circumstances we confront that dictate how we, you know, the lives we experience. So, choose to be happy literally in every moment. And and again, I'm not saying it's easy. Again, and I'm not you know I'm not saying it's always easy for me, but it's certainly a worthwhile endeavor. I mean, you know, you spill on yourself or you you knock something over or you know, you're late for a meeting or you know, it it can derail you. It can be you know, something quote unquote awful or you know, meanwhile most of the world is worried about uh you know, health care and food and clothing. But um you know, or you can choose to laugh about it. You can choose to have fun with it. You can choose to let it go and um again, every I think every moment is is you know, uh an amalgam of of precisely those choices. You know, you're the master of your reality. And you know, once you buy that once you're willing to take responsibility for the fact that you know, you are literally creating uh the life you are experiencing, the reality, you know, your reality is your creation. Again, the rest is details. You know, again, this notion of of the critic and and this notion of uh the way we, you know, um can keep ourselves off the stage and or we can be our own, you know, worst enemies um in terms of our fear of failure. You know, there's several at several sort of key moments in my life there were two really simple questions uh that I've used to try to take back control of my reality in those situations, you know, one being what is it truly that I aim to accomplish? I think very often when uh we find ourselves debilitated by uh you know, fear of failure, that that you know, that critic, anxiety, you know, whatever it can be a relief to say, "Whoa whoa whoa, wait a minute. I am loading so much junk onto this onto what's going on here and to what's at stake. Let let me just take a step back and remind myself what am I in this for, right? What am I trying to accomplish? What you know, what what is my endeavor here? What's my purpose?" And and oftentimes uh in my experience once when you do that, there's kind of a a big sigh of relief to say, "Oh, yeah. This really isn't all that big a deal. This isn't so bad." And the second one really is is is uh "What's my best next step, right? Let's focus on today, this moment, right now." In truth, that's all there ever is, Right? So, we spend a lot of time on uh doom and gloom, future foreboding, you know, awfulizing, and not enough time on this moment right now. What is my best next step? What can I do right now to make progress? And you know, the truth of the matter is the world changes, you know, a million times a day. You're going to change a million times a day. Uh who knows what's going to happen on the journey from, you know, from A to Z. Just focus on getting from A to B. And get that done. And we'll worry about C to Z later.