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“It’s realizing that a great dream is not as good as a great memory. The dream can be had by anyone. The memory – must be made.”

—Eric Thomas—

You know, when I read that quote, I can’t help but to think about my current situation. Life, this life. My life, This life that I live. Some people wish they had my life while I wish I had someone else’s life.

Todays Date: January 23-2020

The Time: 9:49pm

The Place: The club in the ATX

Max here,

The last week or two has been oddly stressful. Maybe it’s the tax thing, maybe it’s my boss here at work. I’m not sure, but something has me on edge. And if there is anything that I have learned is that when you allow yourself to focus on your stress then you end up missing your opportunities. You end up missing everything positive that can happen in your life. And I’ll be damned if I keep allowing this to happen to me. Somehow I MUST shake this funk.

Work at the club lately has been stressful. This is the slow time of the year, and I could get deep into the politics and the drama, but I will save all of that for when I no longer need to work here. So what I will say is that I can feel my Boss notch up the “push button”. And when he starts to “push” everyone feels it. And for an environment that is supposed to be “fun”…. somehow fun is the last thing that ANYONE thinks about when that button is pushed….. But then again…… what do I know, I’m not the boss, I am not in his position. Nor do I want to be in his position. I have my own demons to slay. But yea, stress at work has definitely been notched up. And that stress overlays and specifically correlates to the money that I (or any of the girls) can make. And for me this relationship between me and the girls and money is a symbiotic relationship. Because if the girls can’t enjoy themselves here at work, then they have a harder time to make money. And if they can’t make money, then I can’t make money. It’s the ultimate “ride or die” situation with me and the girls. And so I do everything I can to keep the girls happy (within what rules I can bend but not break).

So lets add that to my already heightened stress of being forced by US law to pay the IRS the money they want. And don’t forget I still have an apartment and two houses that are not making money because they need remodeling to get them up and running. I know that SOMEHOW I will get things working and I know that somehow I will get thru this, But it’s times like this that really test my mental ability to smile. That test my mental ability to focus on the now, that test on my ability to be happy, to not be negative, to not be sad, to not be in an emotional funk…. you get the point. Focus on your future and not on your surroundings. Focus on “your” future and not on the bad things that you “think” might happen. Focus on your future and not what others try to paint for your life….. TD Jakes said it best…… “The lord told me to warn you…keep flying, but don’t read the dial”

The question for the night is this…. what tricks, what mind hacks, what techniques, what things can I find up my sleeve that I can use to scathe off this fear, this negativity, this feeling of not having what I need, what can I do to rid myself of this mental attack that has been thrown upon me. I love what Wayne Dyer said about this issue. “When you squeeze an orange, you get orange juice. You don’t get apple juice or grape juice.”

But what does that mean, What the hell is he talking about when he says that quote about orange juice? From the way I see it, he is saying that it comes from within. You see, we are the ones that create this idea of fear. This so called “orange juice”.Well…. maybe we don’t “completely” create it, but we do allow it to manifest itself in our mind and if we let it stay in our mind, then it grows roots and travels to all facets of our body and even begins to rot our soul. It will literally eat at us from the inside out.

Let me give you a real world example. This past week (on Tuesday) I was at my Rotary club meeting, at the meeting, each week, we have a speaker that talks to us about their job, their life, or their business (usually a non profit business). This week the speaker happened to be a forensic police officer for the City of San Antonio (specifically Bexar County). Her job is to do real life detective work. (much like what you see on that TV show CSI) Overall it was a good presentation. And at the end of the meeting when everyone was leaving, I decided to walk up to her and ask her a few more questions. And thru the course of learning about why and how she got started in her career, she said something that blew my mind….. She said that because of what she now knows (To be specific, because of all the bad things that she studies and works on at her job) she almost no longer goes outside after dark.

I was like…..”Excuse me?? You don’t go outside when it is dark?” This blew my mind because as you know I work in a club and making music is a passion of mine, and so most people that make music and most people that work in a club, easily go out after dark. It’s actually almost a given. So going outside after dark is quite normal for many Americans. So to hear that she doesn’t venture out after dark inquired me to probe just a little farther. It turns out that before her job she didn’t have this feeling, this sense of what I call “fear” but after doing her job for X number of years, she no longer feels comfortable about going outdoors when it is dark. I got the distinct feeling that she would do everything possible to not let her and her husband go outside after dark, and she would definitely NOT go outside alone after dark.

Now this might just seem like a silly thing for someone to have a fear of what could happen to them after dark, someone could murder you, steal from you, hurt you etc. But damn! that could happen at anytime of day or night.

But what does this woman’s fear have to do with my own life? Well… I’m glad you asked…. Remember I am currently stressed. I am at this moment living in “negative possibilities”. I have chained myself to negative thoughts of what “could” happen, rather than positive thoughts of what I expect to happen in my life. I am doing exactly what that forensic officer is doing, I am living in a world of scarcity. I am allowing myself to be afraid of the dark. And that’s the last thing that I want to do. You will never be your best if you allow yourself to be afraid of the dark. The truth is this BAD SHIT HAPPENS, that’s part of what equalizes life for everyone. Bad shit happens everywhere and all the time, not just at night. but if you allow yourself to focus more on “negative could be’s” in your life, then you will ALWAYS find ways to connect to negativity. And for me I have decided that my life is not about negative, my life is about positive, my life is about creation of beauty, creation of building a positive frame from which I can climb to a higher state of life. And like Stephen Covey always said, We must always sharpen the saw”. This means that we must constantly keep trying to learn, keep trying to evolve, keep working on sharpening our minds, keep trying to find a higher and better version of our self.

So whats the trick to solving this puzzle of not allowing fear to set foot in your mental house? Whats the technique to vanquishing this disease of negativity that plagues our minds? It’s simple…. Well in theory it’s simple. But in reality, its work. Or as Eric Thomas would say, It’s a muscle. A mental muscle that must be worked, especially if the mind is going to combat this disease that I call negativity. Call it a perspective. Call it a new way of thinking. Call it a fresh thought. Either way, how you frame or reframe anything is how you will live your life.

Now back to my so called “problems”, but what instead, I rather name as “my challenges”. The IRS, and my boss. These things plague my mind only because it cuts at the heart of my life…aka…. my money… That’s the very thing that helped to sprout the beginning of this whole blog. But now, as of today, what I must do in order to shake this demon is to reframe, refocus, and reconceptualize my perspective. Tony Robbins is notorious for saying…. It’s not about the amount of resources that you have, instead it’s how resourceful you can be with what you have. For me, the question is, how resourceful can I be, and how joyous can I be in spite of how my boss unknowingly tries to make me feel, and in spite of me never having to have felt the painful feeling of  paying so much money to the IRS.

I know I can do this. I know I can do this. I know I can do this. I know I can do this.

I must do this. I must do this. I must do this. I must do this. I must do this. I must do this.

I have one life right? I have one opportunity given to me called “this life”, I have only this life to achieve something greater than my mind can ever conceive. Will I allow my boss to unknowingly mentally put me in fear? Fuck NO! Will I allow the IRS to scare the shit out of me? Hell NO. (Well maybe a little bit) but still. I will reshape my life. And I will and MUST reshape my surroundings.

So what else has been happening in my life. Well I’m still getting closer to doing my YouTube channel. That is still uber scary for me. But F-it. Nothing ventured, nothing gained right?. So far for the channel, I have purchased a desk and some photography/video lighting. The next step is now to buy a chair, and to begin doing some story boarding and also hire an interior designer to help me with the set. I know that I can do it half ass and not use any of the aforementioned items or people, but half ass is the way that I have been forced to naturally live my whole life….. Come to think of it, that’s probably why I typically try to go overboard on doing things. Hmmmmm. Something for me to think about…… So half ass???? Only if I have to.

So yea, YouTube channel, it’s coming….Ugggghhhh just thinking about it, I can feel it scary on the inside. the kinda scary that was like skydiving for the first time. Wow. Similarities eh. F-it, F-it, F-it. Stay tuned!

What about the apartments and my house? Well, Bob has been coming over to help me with my house. Organizing that is. He has been very helpful in helping me to see how I can organize things at home. Funny thing, now that I think about it and see how Bob is helping me…. I am currently really bad at organizing. Like I know what I want, but I don’t know how to put it together….(Or maybe I just don’t want to do the work of putting it together. I don’t know, I’m not sure yet). Although, I’m great at creativity, but organizing….. just currently not my strong suite. But that’s why I will hire people to do that for me. If I can keep having Bob help me, then by the end of this year, most of my house will be organized and I should feel like I know where everything is in my house. It’s been a long time coming…. my house that is. It’s still only about 75% completed, and I began building it over 10 years ago! Time flys! But again. F-it! Of my closest friends (while growing up) I so far have accomplished the most. Or at least I’m pretty sure that I have accomplished the most, concerning toys and from a financial perspective, (And I haven’t even done anything yet) Just wait till I really get started.

Now what about the 4plex. God, that almost makes me sad. My goal was to have that final apartment remodeled and ready to rent by January. And as of today it is still not completed. My main guy Hector (that does my best work) has cancer.  Hector has been out of commission for several months but as of  two weeks ago, he told me that he went back to work. And after talking to him about a week ago, he met me at the 4plex and we talked about him working for me on Sunday (this past Sunday). But sadly he never came to work. Something about his knee hurting him. So this left me with the conundrum of how to proceed with things. I am already not sure how much I can spend on this remodeling project with my current IRS situation. (Even though I know roughly how much it is going to cost) I am just going to have to take my time.

So last week, Eddie came to work for me, at my house. But sadly it rained so he was not able to work. I eventually talked to him later that day. Somehow he doesn’t have a phone. I get to think that this is on purpose, him not having a phone. I found out today that his wife is in jail. Something about her going to be there for about 3 years or so. And oddly enough, for the last several weeks, Eddie actually looks good. He doesn’t look so stressed. Plus he is now staying at his sister’s house. Maybe its the fact that he has a place to stay that allows him to not feel or look so stressed and almost sickly, or maybe it’s the fact that his wife is not around so he is not so worried about how to create a life with him and his wife….. Or…. Maybe……maybe its both or something in between. Either way, Eddie looks good lately. I even told him that I liked the way he looked. So today I had Eddie do some work at the 4plex. I MUST get that final apartment finished. A couple of days ago I had Eddie go to the 4plex and clean up the trash in the apartment and then today I had him begin work on recessing the cabinets into the wall. Yup…. recess the cabinets into the wall.

This particular unit just doesn’t have enough space, it doesn’t have enough comfortable breathing room, and yet I need to create space in the kitchen. I need to give a feeling of modern comfort, a small amount of elegance and a view that allows the prospective tenant to want to create and add to something that they want to call home. Even my electrician John was there to lay in some lighting. Sadly I have now moved the goal post of completion from January to March. Wow that’s only 2 months away. What’s crazy is that the place is truly really close to being completed. the major hurdle is going to be the cement counter tops and the laminate flooring. Everything else is minor work. Even the recessing of the cabinets is truly minor work. It’s not super easy but its not complicated. Nor is it as time consuming as laying laminate flooring in a WHOLE apartment. So my goal is to hopefully get Hector at the apartment to do all the minor things and to also get John to finish out the electrical stuff. Then I can get Eddie to finish out the cabinets, the flooring, and some outside deck work. I am really hoping that I don’t have to move the goal post farther out to June. We will have to see how this next week goes. I must have faith. (at least that MUST be my new belief)

So overall, my week…. stressful, but after this writing, I have been able to see that the last thing I want to do is to be scared of the dark like that forensic officer. Life is always going to throw us curve balls, and sometimes it will knock us to our knees, and we might even need to take a minute to catch our breathe, but the moment that you can catch your breathe you need to remember that you have a purpose and a goal to achieve. You must get back up and rage forward. Remember that nobody is going to grab your hand and walk your path for you. Every chance that you can get, remember that your life is worth it, that your dreams are worth it, remember that you were put on this planet to make a positive difference in life. If you look at your past, it can easily tell you that you should not venture past the realm of known possibilities, but sometimes sometimes you need to use your memories of your past (and even current moments) as a way to piss and tick you off, such that if fuels your fire to get to your goals. If your reading these words, and you got this far into the post, then it must be because somewhere inside of you, you also want to achieve and do great things in life….Push forward. Don’t stop!

I will leave you with the following words from Lisa Nichols. And I paraphrase… Lisa once said……My grandmother always said, Baby, when you get my age, your supposed to sit in your favorite rocking chair and tell the greatest stories of your life, but at your age baby, your supposed to make sure that the story of your life is going to be the greatest thing to tell.

So for what it’s worth….If your life doesn’t have any ups and downs, then how can it really be a great story to tell.

Love,

Max.