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The date: November 11-2019….. The Time: 11:59pm…… The Place:  The club in the ATX

You have one choice in life…..To always be happy, or always be sad.

—Unknown—

Max here,

I just wanted to get a quick post in. Today in about 5 hours I will be at the airport walking thru all the people trying to traverse my way thru the airport process on my way to my first of 3 planes to Bogota Columbia.

In preparation for this trip I had to ensure that I had everything for me and my brother, and oddly enough I had everything packed except one important document…. My passport! It’s a good thing my friend Anthony, unknowingly helped me to remember to turn the car around, drive back home and pick it up. I was almost on the freeway when my conversation with Anthony helped me to remember about whether or not I packed my passport. (Thank you Anthony)

But so as I was driving to work, there were 2 places that I needed to stop on my way to work, one was the bank and the other was Walmart. And somehow I got caught up in my own mind watching videos about how to better my life. And in the back of my mind was also the thoughts about the day ahead of my at work and my plane rides to Columbia. I got so caught up that I drove completely passed the bank as I left town. It wasn’t until I left Walmart in New Braunsfels that I remembered about needing to go to the bank. Luckily for me, there was one of my institutions in New Braunsfels. Now what’s my purpose for needing to go to the bank…..Well, I have not yet learned how to keep a large balance in the bank, and I am also going to try and use my bank card as often as possible while in Bogota, this should help on the cost of exchange rates for purchases.

So why am I mentioning all this…. Well, while on my way to the bank, I got stopped by a state highway patrol officer. He stopped me because I have a light bar (a light bar about 24 inches long full of LEDs) most people use these on pickup trucks and off road vehicles. I use it because one of my headlights on my tiny little Toyota yaris is out. But yeah, He stopped me because he said that I am only supposed to be using that light bar when I am using my high beam lights. Personally I think he was full of shit in his reasoning, but whatever….. He is the cop and I am just the pee-on person that is driving on a road that he is allowed to control in whatever way he deems.

So I tried to be as nice as possible, but I am sure that he was clearly able to see my frustration, as he kept asking question after question…half way thru his interrogation I couldn’t help but to tell him how frustrated I am with his questioning. I wasn’t mean about it, but I ended up explaining every god damn thing about my reasoning for even fucking being in my car. I didn’t curse at him, but he could definitely tell that I wasn’t happy with all his fucking questions.

In the end I still got a ticket for an expired registration, and maybe even for the light bar, (I didn’t care to look at the ticket) Needless to say I was upset, and bitched about the situation to myself…. But oddly enough the bitching didn’t last long. Even at this moment of writing, as I relive the moment, I can feel myself become upset (Ugggghhhh!!! Fuck!!!) but fuck, what can I do, it’s already done. I can’t change events even though my mind can think of other things I “should” have done to avoid that fucking ticket. Ugggghhh Fuck!!!

OK… Fuck it, that’s it, I’m over it… All I can do is to believe that somehow there is something good that is going to come from it. IDK what, but God dammit, something positive MUST come from it. That’s the only way that I must think about every situation in my life. I’m at the point where if I don’t learn and practice daily on this mindset then somehow I am not going to be prepared for the slightest blessing that is already in route and coming my way. Truly the ticket upsets me, but it’s just one moment (of a million moments in my life) and that moment is there to teach me something, even if it is something that I am not yet disciplined to learn. (But I’m getting there)

So this post….. In life….. we are given many, many choices. we have as many choices as there are stars in the universe. But ultimately and truly in life, there is really only one REAL choice. All other choices are just sub choices….. And that one real choice is this…

You really only have once choice in life…… at every moment of your life, you can either choose to be happy or choose to be sad. Even in the toughest moments, even in the shittiest of moments, even in the moments where you are lost or where you feel completely alone….. Your first, and always first choice is to choose to feel “happy ” or choose to feel “sad”…. And for me after the ticket, I bitched for a minute, maybe 2. (that’s really good for me, that I was able to only bitch for a minute or 2) But then I let it go, I allowed myself to continue my day. It’s that internal switch, that internal muscle that I have been working on, that allowed me to not stay glued and stuck to negativity.

God now that I think about it, for at least 3 to 5 years I have been listening to video after video, about what it takes to be successful, and as my mind quickly skims all of the fringes of my brain for  all the videos that I have watched, it really turns out to be that truly successful people (the ones that live amazing lives and stay happiest the longest) seem to say the same thing, they usually say it in hundreds of different ways, and they all have a different perspective as to how it looks and or feels to them, but somehow it all boils down to the same thing… Whether you call it luck, or opportunity, or flow state, or even give it a material name like money, or house, or children, or any term known to man…. it all really boils down to this… success FIRST starts with “choosing to be happy”.

Why is this the very first thing to do???

Everything that I have learned says that when people who are NOT happy and still achieve their material goals, that somehow they still feel empty inside. and they feel even worse about their life than when they first started their journey to material success. And so as I have been studying this thing called success, I have come to feel, see, believe that this thing we call “luck” happens most often when people are not only prepared for physical opportunities, but more so when they choose to be happy about events in their life, And yes! even the shitty and bad moments of life. IDK why this works, but maybe it’s because a smile really does go a long way. Maybe it’s that when you want the highest success possible, you realize that it never happens alone. Maybe it’s because you realize that to achieve the greatest success possible, that you are going to need the help of many people along your journey in life. (this idea has eluded me for a very long time, but not anymore). And if you can just find a way to smile at every turn, at every dip, at every hill, at every hurdle, and even at every mountain of a challenge or fucking setback…… If you can just find a way to smile at every one of those moments, regardless of the event, then somehow the universe will somehow find a way to smile back at you…. And somehow that smile seems to turn out to be the key to “real success” aka real luck.

So for me as I was driving to work after my encounter with the ticket that I was given, I continued to listen to the youtube videos about success and entrepreneurship, and maybe it was the video I watched of Dan Lok, and maybe it was him that said the above quote that started this post or maybe it was just what he was talking about that allowed me to connect the dots of happiness and success. IDK, really I just don’t know, but what I do know is that the more that I “choose” to be happy, in spite of all the hills, all the valleys, all the rigid mountains, and setbacks, and even the kicks in the face, then the more that I find that “luck”  —— What I like to call the “fast track” to my goals is achieved by me doing things in the following way…..

You see, I’ve already wasted too much of my life not looking at life from the proper perspective, (drinking ALOT, a life of bad surroundings, a life of friends and relationships without real goals, no mentors, lack of personal self belief, (did I mention NO MENTORS), and a childhood void of nurturing for success and instead it was a childhood that only paved a basic road for staying alive in a world that I was not taught to comprehend at its highest level because basic survival was the thing that my mom herself was deep into trying to achieve. (I love you mom)

And so for me, if I am going to live in this thing called life and if I am only allowed a limited number of sunsets in life, then I might as well take a moment to notice them and be thankful for everyone of them regardless of the perspective that it is shown to me.

TY God.

Love,

Max.