Building Yourself Brick by Brick

It’s one thing to try to build but it’s another entirely when the foundation is strong.

Would you rather build your house on a mountain of sand or on rock?

The waves and the wind and the storms of the world will disrupt and destroy one house; the other house will remain strong and sturdy.

“It’s necessary to invent yourself. The earlier the better.” — Joe Duncan

Everyone has different things that they do to remain centered and maintain their foundation. Some people call their parents every day, others will read the Bible, some people will workout on a daily basis. What do you do?

Each of us has bricks, we have foundations that we can lay within our lives. We have the choice to use these bricks for constructive purposes or to break down and destroy.

We all have different goals in mind, some of us want to use our bricks to build a fortress around us, others want to build a home that can host others, and still, others want to just throw their bricks around.

When you look back at the past week, where did you focus? What did you fail at in the past 7 days?
Then, how close does that failure feel? Does it feel like you could be there in that moment again if you tried?

We want to experience failure and then be able to reflect on it. That means we should be able to empathize with our past self but at the same time, we need to be able to take strides forward afterward.

There are going to be times when we find ourselves lost. We look around for the next place to lay a brick but there is no place for the next one. As long as the foundation is strong, this isn’t a concern. We can simply tear down the roof and build a couple stories taller.

But if the foundation is weak, we might have to start entirely over — that’s what we will want to avoid.

“Following your genuine intellectual curiosity is a better foundation for a career than following whatever is making money right now.” — Naval Ravikant

It’s one thing to try to build but it’s another entirely when the foundation is strong.

What are you doing today to reinforce your foundation? Is it a strong foundation?

Some of the most successful people spend hours upon hours reading. When’s the last time that you spent more than 60 minutes reading a book that you can learn from in a day?

Maybe you should change that.

Maybe you should go borrow a book, dust one off of your shelf, or go buy one.

How soon could you do that? Spend one day this week reading for at least 60 minutes — uninterrupted. Silence the phone, close the door, shut the computer down, turn off the television. All you need is good posture and a highlighter.

Soon enough, that’s the first brick. Now keep adding to it. Can you read 5 pages a day? I think you can. That’s no more than 10 or 15 minutes per day.

When we think about resiliency, we first need to look inwardly. We need to look at who we are so we can identify who we want to become.

We are always in motion — we need to decide which direction we want to move.

“When everything is happening around you, find and maintain the peace within you.”